Wall $treet Week with FORTUNE to Debut on PBS in Fall 2002
Prominent Financial Magazine Collaborates With
Maryland Public Television
To Produce New Friday Night Series

OWINGS MILLS, MD: Maryland Public Television and FORTUNE announced today a partnership to produce Wall $treet Week with FORTUNE, a new version of the long-running Friday night business show on PBS. The show, which will replace Wall $treet Week With Louis Rukeyser, will air at 8:30 p.m. ET each Friday beginning in Fall 2002.

"This is a great partnership," said John Needham, president of FORTUNE Multimedia. "Between Wall $treet Week and FORTUNE we'll bring more than a century of business and financial credibility to PBS viewers every week. We are honored to join forces with America's highest rated and most trusted weekly business program."

"This strategic alliance with FORTUNE raises the bar for financial television," said Robert J. Shuman, Maryland Public Television president and CEO. "The depth and breadth of FORTUNE's business and economic coverage is a good fit with the needs of PBS's financial program viewers. By drawing on MPT's production expertise and Fortune's journalistic resources, the show promises to be lively, informative, and appealing to a wide range of viewers. Together, we can offer television audiences a powerful source of information in a format that's engaging and easy to watch."

One of the most visible results of the collaboration will be the weekly presence of Geoffrey Colvin, FORTUNE Editorial Director, in his new role as co-anchor of Wall $treet Week with FORTUNE. Colvin is one of America's preeminent business broadcasters, heard daily on the CBS Radio Network, where he has made more than 6,000 broadcasts and is heard by some 7 million people each week. He has appeared on Today, Good Morning America, CBS This Morning, ABC's World News Tonight, CNN, public television's Nightly Business Report, and dozens of other programs, and has been a frequent co-anchor of CNBC's Squawk Box. As a longtime editor and columnist for FORTUNE, Colvin has become one of America's sharpest and most respected commentators on the infotech revolution, the shareholder value imperative, corporate governance, and related issues.

Full plans for the format of the new series are under development. While the pacing is expected to be brisk, the show will take time to feature careful analysis of financial news, in-depth conversation, and the perspectives of industry experts, so that older and younger viewers alike will be comfortable with the thorough treatment of information as well as the style in which it is delivered. A newly designed, multi-purpose set and an up-to-date television graphics package will make the appearance of the show as fresh as the economic news it examines. FORTUNE journalists, as well as other financial industry professionals, will be among those appearing as panelists or commentators, and the show will feature prominent economic and financial experts as guests.

As the new production team is taking shape at Maryland Public Television, much of the new show's format is being developed with the assistance of MPT's production development consultant, Jeff Gralnick. An Emmy Award-winning broadcast producer and executive, Gralnick brings 40 years of broadcast expertise to the project. He has served as executive producer of ABC's World News Tonight and NBC's Nightly News with Tom Brokaw, and was Vice President and Special Assistant to the President and Chairman for programming and program development at ABC News. Before forming his own consulting company, Gralnick served as executive vice president of CNN Financial News.

The plans for the new show focus on retaining traditional PBS viewers and building the show's audience in the years ahead, said Maryland Public Television's Shuman. "We want to make certain that Wall $treet Week with FORTUNE can enjoy the same sort of loyal following for the next 3 decades that our financial programming has had in the past 3 decades. The opportunity to partner with FORTUNE arose at exactly the right time."
"This is an important new collaboration between Maryland Public Television and FORTUNE that we believe will bring unparalleled content to the PBS Friday night lineup," said Pat Mitchell, PBS president and CEO. "This is one of the great brands of public television, and it's gratifying to see the new partnership sustaining the brand to make certain it remains great in the future. With this new format, we will become even stronger in providing our viewers with a weekly wrap-up of events, a Friday evening report that helps them understand the week that just ended and prepares them with valuable insights for the week ahead," Mitchell said.

About FORTUNE:
FORTUNE, the leading biweekly business magazine, is known for its unrivaled access to industry leaders and decision makers throughout the world. Fortune's annual ranking of the 500 largest corporations, the FORTUNE 500, is the ultimate benchmark of business success. Founded in 1930, FORTUNE has grown to a worldwide circulation of more than 1 million and a worldwide readership of nearly 5 million. The Website, fortune.com, which averages 10 million page views per month, keeps visitors ahead of the business curve by providing up-to-the-minute information and analysis of the people and trends driving business innovation. The FORTUNE Conference Division extends the magazine's editorial mission into live settings, hosting a wide range of annual conferences for top-level executives, including the FORTUNE Global Forum, the FORTUNE 500 Forum, and the Executive Summit on the Most Powerful Women in Business. The FORTUNE Group at Time Inc., a division of AOL Time Warner, is comprised of FORTUNE, FSB: FORTUNE Small Business, and Business 2.0.

About Maryland Public Television
Maryland Public Television (MPT) is among the largest producers of national programs for public television. Major series include MotorWeek, Mollie Katzen's Cooking Show, Baking with Julia (with Julia Child), Jewish Cooking with Joan Nathan, National Geographic Bee and Wall $treet Week With Louis Rukeyser. More information is available on MPT's Website at mpt.org.

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