Wednesday, December 14, 2016

Tech executives arrive for the big meeting with Trump Tech executives arrive for the big meeting with Trump

Trump TowerGetty/Spencer Platt

Silicon Valley's most powerful executives will meet with president-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday at Trump Tower, and they're beginning to arrive.

The meeting marks the first major summit between technology leaders and Trump, who has had a shaky relationship with the tech industry and who publicly criticized companies like Apple and Amazon while running for office.

The CEOs of the three most valuable public American companies by market cap, Apple, Alphabet, and Microsoft, will attend, according to reports. 

The Washington Post reports there is no formal agenda but that Silicon Valley leaders expect to break the ice with the new administration. 

Although nobody has seen a complete list of attendees, according to the Post, the invites were distributed widely to top tech companies and the meeting "is going to be a dog pile," according to a person with knowledge of the invite. 

Here are some expected attendees:

  • Apple CEO Tim Cook
  • Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella
  • Alphabet CEO Larry Page
  • Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos
  • Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg
  • Tesla CEO Elon Musk
  • IBM CEO Ginni Rometty
  • Intel CEO Brian Krzanich

Cook and Musk will also hang around after the roundtable for a separate and subsequent meeting with Trump, the transition team tells Business Insider. 

Cook had campaigned for Hillary Clinton, the democratic nominee for president, and held a fundraiser for her in August. 

Silicon Valley chronicler Kara Swisher writes that Trump's team, and transition official Peter Thiel, had a hard time convincing some of these executives to attend: 

"Now I know from those close to the process that Thiel — the big Silicon Valley money man who is also on the Facebook board — and others helping Trump reach out to the tech community had a hard time convincing them to attend. And I know that tech leaders probably had little choice in accepting the invitation, even if they wanted to decline, opting to engage now even if they later oppose Trump."

This is a developing news story and this post will be updated as more information comes in. Business Insider has a correspondent at Trump Tower. Click here to refresh. 

The photos and video

Oracle CEO Safra Catz has already been seen taking the elevator up Trump Tower. 

Safra Catz Trump TowerBI

You can stream the Trump Tower video feed on CSPAN. 

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