High-tech lobby makes surprise pick for new president
The Information Technology Industry Council, which represents Apple, Dell Computer, Hewlett-Packard, IBM and other major high-tech companies, surprised some tech policy watchers today by announcing that longtime president Rhett Dawson's successor will be Dean Garfield, best known for helping to sink illegal Internet file-sharing operations Grokster and Kazaa.
Comment on this article in The Forum.Garfield is chief strategic officer for the Motion Picture Association of America and will take the helm at ITI when Dawson retires in December. Prior to joining ITI in 1993, Dawson served in the Reagan administration as assistant to the president for operations and was an executive at Potomac Electric Power Co.
Garfield was selected after an extensive search led by ITI Board Chairwoman Laura Ipsen, a senior vice president at Cisco Systems. Industry sources initially thought the trade group's top lobbyist, Ralph Hellmann, a former GOP congressional leadership aide, could be the heir apparent.
Garfield, who previously worked as vice president of legal affairs at the Recording Industry Association of America, is "the ideal candidate to lead ITI" as society enters an era "when the merging of information technology, media and content create enormous opportunities and new policy challenges," Ipsen said in a news release. In a statement, Garfield said he looks forward to using experience in the technology policy arena in his new capacity to address issues like energy, competitiveness and trade.
Some policy insiders questioned ITI's choice, wondering whether an executive with so much time invested in Hollywood would undergo a culture shock in Silicon Valley -- particularly since the two sectors have been battling for years in Congress and in the courts over how to deal with copyright protections in the digital age. Sources also pointed out that some ITI member companies have been neutral or adversarial on IP disputes over the years. One said if Garfield "brings his philosophical baggage along, it is sure to cause some conflicts." But on other issues like immigration and competitiveness, Garfield will be a good fit, they said.
Tapping Garfield to lead ITI makes perfect sense, another tech insider said, because industry officials in Washington have been thinking about how they could benefit from consolidating multiple trade groups' policy efforts and speaking with a single, unified voice.
"The model that tech has always used is MPAA," the source said. The American Electronics Association and the Information Technology Association of America took a step in that direction last month when they announced plans to merge. "Given the shoes this new executive has to fill, he must be an impressive guy, and I look forward to working with him," ITAA President Phil Bond said. RIAA lobbyist Mitch Glazier said Garfield was an "inspired choice" to head ITI and is "liked very much by both the IP and tech communities."
During his tenure at MPAA, Garfield tried to help studios and high-tech companies come together on projects that would benefit them both, such as developing new revenue streams.