Steve Capus to step down as president of NBC News after eight years

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2013/feb/01/steve-capus-president-nbc-news

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After nearly eight years as president of NBC News, during which its nightly newscast remained the top-rated of the big three networks, Steve Capus announced Friday that he will be stepping down.

Capus, 49, said he would be leaving in "the coming weeks", in a 1,000-word memo to colleagues, first obtained by Politico. He did not give a reason for his departure, and no replacement has been named.

"It has been a privilege to have spent two decades here, but it is now time to head in a new direction," Capus wrote. "I have informed Pat Fili-Krushel that I will be leaving NBC News in the coming weeks."

The New York Times pointed out that rumors of Capus' departure have swirled since Fili-Krushel became his boss last July. Fili-Krushel was promoted after Steve Burke, her former boss at rival network ABC, took over as president of NBC Universal in 2011.

In her own memo to staff Friday, Fili-Krushel called Capus a "highly regarded leader" and said he had "decided to leave the company to pursue the next phase of his career".

"Steve has been a friend, boss and mentor to a great many people at NBC News for a long time and we will all miss him very much," Fili-Krushel wrote.

Capus's departure comes at a time of unusual turmoil in the ranks of US television news executives and talent. Last month the man who elevated Capus at NBC, Jeff Zucker, took over as head of CNN Worldwide.

Since Zucker took the reins at CNN, that network has gone on a buying spree, poaching talent from ABC News in particular, including politics star Jake Tapper, the popular correspondent John Berman and law correspondent Chris Cuomo.

Capus' star at NBC News rose in tandem with the network's top anchor, Brian Williams. In the late 1990s Capus produced Williams's show for NBC's cable channel, MSNBC. When Williams slid into the anchor chair at NBC Nightly News, Capus became executive producer, a job that positioned him to take over the entire news division in 2005.

While the Nightly News has retained its crown, the luster of other NBC properties has faded somewhat. In particular, NBC's Today show lost its pre-eminence to a revived Good Morning America on ABC.

Over the course of his career Capus received multiple Emmys and Edward R Murrow awards and an Alfred I duPont award. "Of course, it is an extremely difficult decision to walk away from a place that has been the backdrop for everything in my life since 1993," Capus wrote.

In his memo, Capus did not reveal future career plans.