President Trump on Thursday vowed to cut back on “job-killing” regulations on the tech industry in a meeting with business executives.
Trump met with leaders from the drone and broadband industries at the White House, the latest event in the administration’s “tech week.”
“We want to remain number one in certain areas,” Trump said. “We’re going to give you the competitive advantage that you need.”
{mosads}“My administration has been laser focused on removing government barriers to job growth and prosperity. We’ve created a deregulation task force to find wasteful, intrusive and job-killing regulations, which there are many,” he continued.
Execs from AT&T, Sprint, Verizon and General Electric Co. joined representatives from drone and venture capital firms attended the meeting, titled “American Leadership in Emerging Technology.”
The administration has been soliciting recommendations on tech policy and modernizing government IT from industry CEOs.
The execs discussed drones, 5G wireless broadband, the so-called Internet of Things and financing emerging technology in three breakout sessions prior to their meeting with the president in the East Room of the White House.
“We had a very good conversation this morning,” said AT&T’s CEO Randall Stephenson at the meeting
“We’re in a place where our industry is a world leader in broadband. And as we now move into a world with 5G, we’re in a place where if we get this right, we’ll probably lead the world in mobile broadband deployment.”
Stephenson showed Trump a demonstration of how 5G technology for wireless phones would be implemented in cities.
Other executives took the opportunity to praise the president.
T-Mobile COO Mike Sievert thanked Trump for “the administration’s open mindedness to the regulatory environment.”
And the CEO of the drone startup PrecisionHawk congratulated the president on “the great job [he’s] been doing.”
Representatives from the companies, particularly in the drone space, told reporters that they were optimistic the administration would listen to their suggestions on how the Federal Aviation Administration should reform drone regulation.
“I think that having the secretary of Transportation sit in our meeting for over an hour to listen to industry leaders is a good sign that they’re amenable to at least taking our suggestions,” one of the drone firm executives said.
Trump also claimed credit for investments in jobs by Sprint’s parent company, Softbank.
“Right after the election [the CEO of SoftBank, Masayoshi Son] came to my office and said ‘because you won, I’m going to invest $50 billion.’ I said, ‘Is that all? Can you do more?’” Trump joked.
Those plans were first announced before Trump’s victory.