South by Southwest to host tech festival in Las Vegas

South by Southwest, a legendary music, film and technology festival held annually in Austin, Texas, is expanding next year to Las Vegas with a new four-day event focused on tech-startup companies.

The SXSW V2V event will be at the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas Aug.11-14. The festival, announced Tuesday, serves to bring startups and venture capital together, as well as to both address massive demand for Interactive content and to expand South by Southwest.

"With the growth and popularity of the startup-related programming across the SXSW family of events, it is clear that there is enough momentum to create a wholly unique and independent event focused on entrepreneurs," said SXSW V2V Producer Christine Auten in a statement.

Auten said the idea behind the festival was about "turning ideas into reality."

Before SXSW V2V kicks off in August, the South by Southwest 2013 Conference & Festival will include SxVegas, a series of events in Austin designed to promote the region's growing tech community.

The SxVegas experience will include demos from local companies, a Vegas-Tech trade show exhibit, and an "Old Vegas" cocktail party and networking event.