New Chief of UPI Has a Background in Politics and Information Business
The new executive in control of United Press International is a one-time California politician and conservative Republican whose business experience ranges from financing biotechnology ventures to operating a cable television network.
Dr. Earl W. Brian, who served as secretary of California’s Health and Welfare Agency when Ronald Reagan was governor, took charge of the news service on Friday after reaching a $55-million agreement with UPI’s owner, Mario Vazquez Rana, a Mexico City businessman.
Brian, 45, said Sunday that he considered revitalizing the financially ailing news agency under American ownership to be an important personal goal. He added, however, that his conservative views would not influence news coverage.
“This thing to me is just a little deeper than an issue of turning another company around,” he said in an interview. “As a conservative Republican, as far as I’m concerned, UPI is an extremely important asset to the American people.”
UPI, which has 180 news bureaus throughout the world, has been losing millions of dollars a year and faces an unknown fate under the new regime. Its fate is of broad interest within the news industry because it is one of two remaining U.S. news services that seek to provide clients with comprehensive coverage of the news, as opposed to specializing in certain areas, such as business. The other is the Associated Press.
Vazquez Rana technically remains UPI’s owner under the complex deal, but he is cooperating with efforts to transfer ownership to Brian in the near future.
Brian said that giving UPI a new emphasis in such areas as financial news and sports scores is under consideration. Brian, who now lives in New York City, said his new management team hopes to have a plan for UPI’s future in 30 days. He is to meet with union officials in Washington today.
“If the market is there for a general news wire service, we’ll have a general news wire service,” he said. “If it’s for something else--or somethings else--we’ll have that.”
Brian is chairman of Infotechnology Corp., a New York firm with at least partial interest in some 22 companies, including Financial News Network, a cable television service. The companies are mostly information and biotechnology firms with combined assets of some $100 million, Brian said.
On Friday, he named Paul Steinle, a former president of Financial News Network, as UPI’s new president. Steinle, 48, has more than 20 years of experience in broadcast journalism, including tenures with the Westinghouse network and a Seattle television station, said Dwight Geduldig, a spokesman for the new management. A former president of Financial News Network, Steinle most recently has served as president of Data Broadcasting Corp., a financial information service controlled by Infotechnology.
In Brian’s brief but visible political career, he served as head of California’s Health and Welfare Agency at the age of 30. In 1974, he sought the Republican nomination to unseat Democratic Sen. Alan Cranston, but lost the primary to state Sen. H.L. “Bill” Richardson. Earlier, he graduated medical school at Duke University and was decorated for his service in the Army Medical Corps in Vietnam.
Referring to his business interests in financial and sports information, news, Brian said: “We believe that a lot of this stuff can be done directly by UPI itself.”
Brian maintained that his views would be “no factor in the political perspective” of UPI. “I’ve been done with politics for 10 years.”
