Musk, Bezos arrive at Trump Tower for tech summit

Source: USA Today:

December 14, 2016 at 14:05

Technology leaders' main expectation from the Trump administration is that the regulators will let businesses run on their own, said Eli Gelman, CEO of Amdocs . Amdocs is a leader in back-end systems for telecom enterprises. Gelman said the potential mergers in the telecom industry such as AT&T /Time Warner and Yahoo! /Verizon VZ will be positive for his business in the coming year because it provides opportunities to provide them with new, updated software. And he said Europe is going through some different political issues following Brexit, but his business is growing there nonetheless. Video provided by TheStreet Newslook

NEW YORK — Tech executives began to filter into Trump Tower Wednesday afternoon to meet with President-elect Donald Trump. Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and Oracle co-CEO Safra Catz were among the first to arrive.

About a dozen tech A-listers — Apple CEO Tim Cook, Alphabet CEO Larry Page, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, IBM CEO Ginni Rometty and Intel CEO Brian Krzanich, among them — were expected to sit down with the president-elect to discuss jobs, immigration policy, free trade, cybersecurity and taxes.

The summit, roughly one month before the billionaire real-estate tycoon is sworn in as 45th president, could offer an early litmus test on how Trump plans to bring jobs to the Rust Belt and other non-tech regions. The attendees represent more than 1.3 million U.S. jobs and a total market cap of $2.9 trillion, according to the Consumer Technology Association.

One area where Trump and tech agree: reforming the tax code. Trump says he plans to slash the corporate tax rate to 15% from 35%, which could prompt tech giants to repatriate money kept overseas. There could also be common ground over Trump's anti-regulatory policies, which might aid start-ups.

Rometty told USA TODAY she intends to lobby Trump on ways to better train American workers so they are qualified to fill "new collar" jobs at Big Blue.

In his year-long sprint to the presidency, Trump has traded barbs with the industry. While President Obama frequently visited Silicon Valley and hosted tech executives at the White House, Trump engaged in tweet-bashing the likes of Apple and Amazon, disparaging their off-shoring of jobs, stances on encryption and tax contributions.

Dozens of executives, meanwhile, signed an open letter opposing Trump's candidacy.

Contributing: Elizabeth Weise in San Francisco.

Follow USA TODAY tech reporters Jon Swartz @jswartz Jessica Guynn @jguynn and Elizabeth Weise @eweise on Twitter.