Larry Irving is the president and CEO of the Irving Group, a consulting firm providing strategic advice and assistance to international telecommunications and information technology companies, foundations and non-profit organizations. From 2009–2011, Irving also served as vice president for global government affairs for the Hewlett-Packard Company, the world’s largest technology company. He addresses different facets of technology and telecommunications (such as wireless, cloud computing, applications, and mobile services); cyber security and its foreign policy implications; the political and economic implications and opportunities of our innovations and technology; the intersection of politics, policy, and technology; international regulations of the internet; technology versus privacy issues; the apps revolution and cloud computing; how small businesses should be using tools like social media and the cloud; how the best companies are using new technology; and what advancements are coming down the pipeline.

The President’s Telecommunication’s Expert. Prior to founding the Irving Group in 1999, Irving served for almost seven years as assistant secretary of commerce for communications and information and administrator of the national telecommunications and information administration (NTIA), where he was a principal advisor to the president, vice president, and secretary of commerce on domestic and international telecommunications and information technology issues.

Irving was one of the principal architects and advocates of the Clinton Administration’s telecommunications and internet policies and was a point person in the successful efforts to reform the United States’ telecommunications laws. Those efforts resulted in passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, the most sweeping change in America’s telecommunications laws in 60 years. Irving was also the senior counsel for the U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee on telecommunications and finance, where he helped draft and negotiate the Cable Television Consumer Protection Act, the Children’s Television Act, and Television Decoder Circuitry Act.

Global Impact. Internationally, Irving is an ardent advocate of regulatory reform. He represented the United States government as sherpa (lead coordinator for the U.S. Government) at the G-7’s first ministerial meeting on the Global Information Society in Brussels and at the Information Society and Development Conference in South Africa, the first ministerial meeting between developing and developed countries to discuss the emerging global internet. Irving was also a key member of the U.S. team that negotiated the World Trade Organization (WTO) agreement on basic telecommunication services.

Irving is widely credited with coining the term the “digital divide” and sparking global interest in the issue. In large part due to his work to promote policies and develop programs to ensure access to advanced telecommunications and information technologies, Irving was named one of Newsweek’s 50 most influential people in the ‘Year of the Internet.’ He is also a resident at the Foreign Policy magazine.

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