Inside the making of TLV:NYC and how it’s connecting Tel Aviv and New York in real-time coverage.
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Show Notes:
In this Mission Matters episode, Adam Torres interviews Nati Katz, Show Host of TLV:NYC on Channel 10. Nati shares his journey from PR to prime-time news and the creation of Israel’s first all-business network—broadcasting from both Wall Street and Tel Aviv. The conversation dives into narrative-building, international collaboration, and the power of purpose-driven media.
Full Unedited Transcript
Hey, I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and if you’d like to apply to be a guest in the show, just head on over to mission matters.com and click on Be Our Guest to Apply. All right, so today, as part of our Milken Global Conference coverage series, where we’re bringing you the best of attendees, of guests, of VIPs, panelists, speakers, and , all kinds of individuals that attended the Milken Global Conference.
In Beverly Hills, which is one of my favorite conferences of the year. And today we have Nazi Katz on the line. And he’s a show host over at T-L-V-N-Y-C, which is on Channel 10, which broadcasts from Wall Street. First thing Nazi, welcome to the show. Adam, thank you so much for having me here.
It’s great to be with you. Alright, so first thing, first Milken Global conference. I know you were there this year. Have you been in the past? Is this your first time? I mean, give us just some of your background and history with the conference. Yeah, certainly have been in the past. It’s not my first time, but like you said it’s one of your favorite conferences of the year.
It’s definitely one of my favorites. And the thing is, in the past I had the pleasure and privilege of accompanying some major CEOs. So, you know, I come from the PR world originally. Mm-hmm. And I’ve accompanied , a variety of CEOs primarily in technology. Who attended the conference. And at that point first of all, I got a firsthand exposure to just how dynamic it is and the level of meetings and interactions that CEOs are having.
, And on that side of, of the spectrum, , I used to facilitate the meetings with media , and press personnel on behalf of my the executives and CEOs that I was accompanying. But. In addition to that, I also had the privilege of sitting in on many of the panels and keynotes. And I’ll tell you a little secret a lot of these CEOs are super busy and they come in sometimes for just a day and leave, and I would opt to stay behind just to enjoy the show.
Mm. Yeah, I couldn’t agree more. And it’s one of the things reasons. I mean, , I set it aside on my calendar every year, and it’s a fun time. And , what I also noticed, and I don’t know if , you’ve noticed this, so , happy to have you chime in, but over time it becomes kind of like a community.
Like you see some of the same people. And it’s just like one of , this thing, you’re walking through the halls, you’re like, wait a minute, wait a minute. How you been? How you been? And it just kind of builds. Is that have you added any of that experience? 100%. It’s such a high profile you know, event that brings in some of the most important decision makers, but mm-hmm.
Even the decision makers, they come in, there’s sometimes the mingling happens in the green room, sometimes at the official, networking session. Yeah. But, but here’s the other thing I could say about Milken. I tend to also go a few months before that to Davos, right. In Switzerland for the world Economic event.
Well, there’s a major difference because sometimes these same people go to both and mm-hmm. In Davos, it’s like January. Okay. So everybody’s just speculating how the year’s gonna roll out. And here we are at Milken in May. And everybody actually has a firm agenda of how it is going and how it’s gonna continue to go.
So the, I I found that the conversations and interactions are extremely productive and very effective at Milken. Mm-hmm. And so aside, aside of just the business, the, you know, the, the play and, and business go well, you know, the interactions, the over, over happy hours and other networking sessions, people really like you say, they catch up with one another.
Just having fun. There’s a lot of fun and it’s probably not, not a circumstance that it’s in LA and Beverly Hills. The whole atmosphere is just extremely energizing. I completely agree. And I let’s switch it a bit. I wanna get into some of your work and what you’re doing with this first and only financial and business news network in Israel.
And , some may argue, you know, it’s the streaming error. I mean, where do you stand? Like, like, talk to us about your work and what you’re working on. Yeah. And, and this is just phenomenal that it happened, even, you know, even if it’s late, it’s better late than ever. Yeah. But look anyone who follows technology, anyone who follows the investment trajectory finance.
Has probably had Israel as a market and as a country on their radar. Mm-hmm. And Israel has evolved into what everybody knows as a startup nation. A lot of the tech and innovation that we use either directly or embedded in larger platforms that, you know, that acquired them. Stems from the Israeli grain power.
And so 76 years, 77 years into the, the country’s establishment. And you still didn’t have a financial, fully devoted financial and business network in Israel. Which is interesting to me, by the way. I didn’t know that when I was kind of looking at it, I’m like, wow, really? Okay, go continue. Well, here’s the thing.
Things are so intense and so serious that you have multiple, regular new networks. Obviously there’s plenty to cover. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. There’s plenty that’s going on. but business and finance, no. Maybe they have a, little, you know, maybe one show, maybe there’s like a business reporter in each of the networks for sure, but not fully devoted network.
And so. Two years in the works. A very good friend of mine, he’s, who’s a really reputable journalist himself, used to be the editor in Chief of Business Week when it was owned by McGraw Hill but not the overall business week. , There was an Israel edition back in like oh eight. He was the editor in chief.
So he is always kind of very well. You know, in proximity and in central to the Israeli finance and mm-hmm. Business and journalism arena. , This is his brainchild. This is his vision. He has this vision for very long, but in the last two years, he actually had the chance to materialize on this, and so January of 25.
This network. Finally got off the ground and one of his, you know, kind of more specific visions is to connect New York and Tel Aviv in a way that really resonates with viewers and compels viewers. And so that’s how he kind of envisioned this show called T-L-V-N-Y-C, which is of course, Tel Aviv’s, New York.
And, and it also has some very innovative and pioneering concept behind it. And that is believe it or not, it’s a show that actually is broadcast in parallel between Tel Aviv and New York. So I share my show. The Tel Aviv studio. There’s a different host on the Tel Aviv side, and I sit in New York with my co-host here, Tal Heinrich, who may know as well.
I sit in Wall Street, they sit in Tel Aviv, and for 90 minutes we just ping pong back and forth on the most important matters of that market today. and other big news. Wow. I love it. I love the concept. It makes total sense to me. And it reminds me of this interview I did. I mean, it was speaking of Milken it was with William Lee, so he’s the or he was, , I don’t know for certain, this was back in like, I think 2023 maybe 2022.
And I interviewed him and he was talking about like one of the ways that he. And he was the chief economist for the Milken Institute. And he was talking about, you know, when he finally, when he first knew that he was gonna be part of this thing, or when he really followed Michael Milk’s work was when he was looking to raise the funding for the first you know, 24 hour kind of like news network.
And everybody thought he was crazy and they’re like, you know, fast forward, this is how we have CNN. Right. So when I capture a story like this, I’m always excited because of it. I could, I could trace it to the root. And I feel like one of the fun part about what we do in capturing these stories is looking back and being like, man, I remember this, or, I remember that.
So it’s gonna be fun as I see this thing grow. I’ll be and oh man, God willing and one day and telling my kids this stuff. Like yeah, I remember when that, when that channel that started. Yeah. I was talking from the trenches. From the trenches. , It’s really trenches. Everybody could attest to it because, you know, at first you’ve seen newsrooms and control rooms.
Oh yeah. Oh yeah. You gotta, you gotta improvise. It’s not gonna just land on you like that. And they put a lot of resources into it, of course. And they created a state of the art environment. Both the studios as well as the control rooms, the newsrooms, everything’s state of the art. But still, you’re at your infancy.
And you have to introduce yourself and you have to explain why is this and what is this? People are not used to kind of a new kid on the block. Mm-hmm. And so how do you think I’m just curious from your PR side and your track record in media like how do you think all this combines to now what you’re doing?
’cause it just seems like a great path , in career and like , a shot at something really, really interesting. Thank you. Yeah, I have a genuine passion for this. And the thing is, I actually started off dabbling in journalism very early on. That didn’t last long. Like very early on.
I’m talking like when I thought that my, my media career should, evolve into journalism and very quickly, Adam, I realized that I actually wanna help shape the story, not just report. The story. Mm-hmm. And that’s when I moved to pr. And as you said, 25 years later, I really am very grateful. I had the privilege of supporting so many sides of companies, startups , and large companies, fortune 100 companies.
Most of my career I served these companies as part of agents. C environments, and those included large agencies like Burst and Marcello and then boutique PR firms. And so , in this career chapter thus far, I’ve come to see the dynamics that help shape narratives, shape a story you know, , perception for sure, executive visibility.
And so when my dear friend Ron Baral, is his name, approached me about the channel, I’m like, sure. I’m, I’m absolutely in because you know, I know how viewers would get most excited most inspired. , And that’s important today. You know, you mentioned the streaming world. Mm-hmm. It’s not a given, you know, we’re all vying for attention from viewers, from listeners.
They have so many platforms they could go to. What are you giving them? And it’s really about them. , It’s not about the host anymore. It’s barely about the guest. It’s really about the viewer and the listener and what you’re giving them. And so putting that all together, you know understanding what makes a good story, I think.
Hopefully serves me well , in shaping you know, soundbite stories now , on a smaller scale show that’s almost daily. Yeah. That’s great. Well, Naty, I mean, this has been, this has been a lot of fun having you on the show and learning more about your work, and I’m excited to continue to watch the growth of Channel 10 and, continue to see the entire project rise, which I think it will.
So that being said, if, somebody’s listening or watching this and they want to follow up or learn more or to connect and, and watch your content and follow your journey, how do they do that? Thank you. Well, I’m on LinkedIn. Very happy to welcome and and meet new contacts. You know, on the, I’m on LinkedIn, I’m on Instagram.
People could absolutely tune into the show. It’s TV 10. So the TV and the number 10 do co il. They’ll find great content there all day long, but certainly our show, which airs daily from 3:00 PM to 4:30 PM Eastern Time and we’re at Wall Street. So we’re also very much a welcoming guest constantly.
Wonderful. And Rudy listening to this, just so you know. We’ll we’ll definitely put some links in the show notes so you can connect and and, and watch the content and speaking to the audience. If this is your first time with Mission Matters and you haven’t done it yet, hit that subscribe or follow button.
This is a daily show. Each and every day we’re bringing new, new ideas, new content, and hopefully new inspiration to help you along the way in your journey as well. So again, hit that subscribe or follow button. And nati, thanks again for coming on the show, Adam. Thank you. It was a pleasure.
