Microsoft and Nvidia: The Tech Giants Taking a Quieter Approach to Trump
The New York Times
Other big technology companies have been boisterous in their courtship of the new administration. But Nvidia and Microsoft have avoided the Washington spotlight.
Friday afternoon last week, Jensen Huang, the chief executive of the chipmaker Nvidia, slipped into the White House to meet President Trump for the first time. There was no fanfare, and he left without a single public photo taken of the two.
Two weeks earlier, Microsoft’s chief executive, Satya Nadella, had a lengthy lunch with Mr. Trump at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. They dined with little fuss and also barely made the news.
Neither executive joined his big tech contemporaries who stood ramrod behind Mr. Trump at his inauguration. Instead, the two were on entirely different continents: Mr. Nadella was traveling to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, while Mr. Huang was wrapping up a visit to see suppliers and employees in Taiwan and China.
The absence at the inauguration of the chief executives of two of the world’s most valuable companies was perhaps the most visual sign that some companies were trying a lower-key approach as Mr. Trump returned to Washington, even as some peers took to flamboyant displays of courtship.
For companies like Microsoft and Nvidia, which unlike many of their peers haven’t angered Mr. Trump, “it is almost business as usual,” said S. Somasegar, a former Microsoft executive now at Madrona Venture Group who speaks regularly with Mr. Nadella.
While Microsoft and Nvidia share a quieter approach to Mr. Trump, their footprints in Washington are the polar opposite. Microsoft, on the cusp of its 50th anniversary and schooled by its antitrust fight more than two decades ago, is arguably tech’s savviest player on policy issues, with a strong lobbying arm and executives who have nurtured contacts in both political parties.
The trade deficit has long drawn the president’s ire. Now, he’s preparing to take it on again.
American companies intent on making goods in the United States are fretting over the impact of tariffs on their access to parts and raw materials.
A growing number of countries, including American allies, are striking trade deals as the Trump administration erects a higher fence around its global commerce.
The invoking of national security to unravel trade agreements could scramble the international trading system in China’s favor.
Canada, Mexico and China account for more than a third of the products brought into the United States. Tariffs could lead to higher prices for consumers.