Amazon.com Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos is riding the Internet revolution right down Locust Walk next Tuesday. The 1999 Time magazine "Man of the Year" -- who created an e-commerce empire from an online bookstore -- is set to discuss the business strategies that have made his company one of the vanguards of the Internet economy during a special taping of the PBS business program CEO Exchange. The three-hour, live program -- hosted by CNN Senior Analyst Jeff Greenfield -- will take place next Tuesday at 5 p.m. in the Annenberg Center's Zellerbach Theatre, before a crowd of mostly Wharton students and faculty members. Bezos will be joined on stage by Land's End CEO David Dyer, who will also address the challenges facing e-commerce. Both executives agreed to participate in a discussion moderated by Greenfield, and they will also take questions from Wharton faculty and students in the audience. According to Wharton Graduate Student Affairs Director Amy Orlov, Wharton conducted a special lottery this week and the winning business school students will be notified that they will receive one ticket to the event. Preference was given to MBA students, although about 200 of the 700 available seats were awarded to Wharton undergraduates. And while the event has so far been restricted to Wharton students, Orlov said that on Tuesday morning, ticketless students in Wharton and Penn's other schools will be able to place their names on a waiting list in Vance Hall, giving them first crack at any remaining seats. "We understand this might be of interest to the entire University," Orlov explained, "but in keeping with the spirit of CEO Exchange, first preference will be given to Wharton [MBAs] and undergraduates." She said PBS producers requested a crowd full of Whartonites for the business-oriented show. Wharton Graduate Association President Assaf Tarnopolsky was quick to point out the attraction of hosting some of the e-tailing's pioneers. "Bezos is a guy who went from Wall Street to the Internet and conquered it," he said. "He can be seen as the model that business students want to emulate today." Bezos founded the Seattle-based Amazon.com in 1995 as an online retailer specializing in books. The company has since expanded its product offerings to include free electronic greeting cards, online auctions, CDs, videos, DVDs, toys, games and electronics. And while Amazon.com has yet to realize a profit, it currently boasts a market capitalization of almost $23 billion. Dyer heads the Chicago-based clothing retailer Land's End, which offers traditional apparel through mail-order catalogues and via the Internet. The company went online in 1995.
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