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Posts Tagged ‘Google’
Wednesday, July 23rd, 2014 by Linnae O'Flahavan
WASHINGTON’S BOUTIQUE LOBBY shops are thriving as a direct result of the major changes cialis online that have plagued K St.
powerhouses in recent cialis cheap years, according to The Hill. In just the first two quarters of 2014, for example, there have been 39 law firm mergers and acquisitions—the total for all of 2010. In the past year, Greenberg Traurig has acquired almost 40 attorneys and lobbyists, including thirteen from rival Dickstein Shapiro.
And Patton Boggs, which has also been losing partners and top lobbyists to other firms such as Holland & Knight and Wilmer Hale, recently announced their merger with Squire Sanders.
Smaller lobby firms are finding success in part by steering clear of this chaos, and by specializing in niche practices that work underneath top tier issues. They’re also benefiting from K St.’s culture of defections and “poaching of talent,” as The Hill describes it, which opens space for more specialized lobby shops to grab hold of significant clients such as Facebook, Google, Verizon, and Goldman Sachs. These major changes, which are supposed to reward the K St. behemoths, are ironically creating room for start-ups to get a stronger foothold.
But while the lobbying landscape is undoubtedly changing at a rapid pace, and the trend seems to indicate that smaller shops are profiting as a consequence, the question remains whether this is sustainable. Once DC’s major players begin to settle down, presumably these unique opportunities will begin to fade. In the meantime, however, there’s yet more poaching to do.
Tags: Dickstein Shapiro, Facebook, Goldman Sachs, Google, Greenberg Traurig, Holland & Knight, Patton Boggs, Squire Sanders, the hill, verizon, Wilmer Hale
Posted in Lobbying News | Comments Off on Niche Lobby Shops Reap Rewards from Big Changes
Friday, January 10th, 2014 by Vbhotla
IT’S UNDERSTOOD WITHIN the beltway that to remain successful, companies should lobby. As Apple learned the hard way, not having friends in Washington can backfire when the political winds are unfavorable. That’s a lesson fellow tech company Yelp has taken to heart, as they’ve dramatically boosted their Washington lobbying presence in the last few months.
Before this fall, it seemed as though Yelp didn’t think much of having advocates on the Hill, but that’s rapidly changing. In October, The Hill reported that the tech company hired its first lobbyist in Laurent Crenshaw, a former aide to Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) on the House Oversight Committee.
Unlike fellow tech companies like Google and Facebook, both of which have had a lobbying presence on Capitol Hill for years, Yelp is late to the lobbying game. But they seem intent on making up for lost time. Ars Technica reports that Yelp registered its first PAC with the Federal Election Commission on December 31st, a sure sign that the company intends to step into the influence game.
So on what issues will Yelp focus its lobbying efforts? As The Hill notes, Yelp depends on user-generated reviews, so it must ensure that it can host negative reviews of businesses without being vulnerable to libel suits. Further, Yelp is seeking the creation of a federal anti-SLAPP (strategic lawsuits against public participation) law. Supporters of the bill argue that such lawsuits are used to intimidate users of companies such as Yelp who post negative reviews of businesses. By supporting an anti-SLAPP bill, Yelp would ensure that its livelihood (namely user reviews) is protected.
Of course, as The Huffington Post notes, Yelp will also likely lobby on many of the same issues that Facebook and Google have backed, in particular the Innovation Act, which seeks to curtail patent trolls and which passed the House of Representatives last month.
Will Yelp’s efforts pay off? History suggests that they will. As The Sunlight Foundation found in 2012, companies who lobby do better than companies that don’t, and with Apple’s advocacy face plant fresh in Silicon Valley’s mind, it seems likely that other tech companies will take Yelp’s lead.
Tags: apple, Ars Technica, darrell issa, Facebook, Federal Election Commission, Google, Innovation Act, Silicon Valley, SLAPP, the hill, The Huffington Post, the sunlight foundation, Yelp
Posted in Lobbying News | Comments Off on Yelp Gives Lobbying Five Stars
Tuesday, July 5th, 2011 by Vbhotla
The internet giant announced Friday that it will hire 12 new lobbying firms in light of recent antitrust probes against the company. Google told The Hill that Akin, Gump; Bingham; Capitol Legislative Strategies; Chesapeake Group; Crossroad Strategies; Gephardt Group; Holland & Knight; Normandy Group; Prime Policy; The First Group; The Madison Group; and the Raben Group were being retained to tell its story in Congress and the FTC.
Crowell Strategies, R.B. Murphy & Associates and the Lugar Group, which were not listed, have all registered to lobby for Google this year. Of those disclosed to The Hill, only Holland & Knight has filed an LD-1 registration.
According to Crowell Strategies‘ Lobbyists.info profile, Google is the company’s largest client, with $52,500 in income reported for last quarter to lobby on communications and copyright/patent/trademark issues. Crowell also represents Cablevision Systems Corporation, Earthlink emily deschanel pokies, DirecTV Group, Consumer Electronics Association, T-Mobile USA, and Zoom Telephonics on similar issues.
R.B. Murphy & Associates, however, represents clients on a broader range of issues, and reported <$5,000 in earnings from Google for Q1 2011. The Lugar Group, which has no reported any income as of yet, also represents a broad range of issues for its various clients. Holland & Knight, LLP, while also representing a wide array of issues, is also the largest of the firms recently registered to represent Google, with more than 1,150 attorneys in 23 offices across the U.S. and around the world and more than $19million in lobbying revenue last year, according to the firm’s Lobbyists.info profile. Holland & Knight, LLP is also the latest firm to register to lobby for Google, with a filing date of June 21.
Tags: akin gump, capitol legislative strategies, chesapeake group, communications lobbying, crossroad strategies, first group, gephardt group, Google, google lobbying, Holland & Knight, lobbying the FTC, lobbyists for google, lugar group, madison group, normandy group, prime policy, r.b. murphy & associates, raben group
Posted in Lobbying News | Comments Off on Google’s New DC Team
Monday, February 28th, 2011 by Vbhotla
The Department of Justice has some concerns about a pending merger between internet giant Google and ITA, a flight information software company. Google announced the acquisition July 1, 2010. Initial reactions around the business community were that the deal merely increased Google’s business; it did not threaten the existence of other travel sites. But members of FairSearch.org, an organization comprised of top internet travel sites, including Expedia, Hotwire, TripAdvisor, Kayak, fear that Google may try to leverage its dominance in the internet search industry to promote its product, thereby damaging their own.
The Department of Justice is threatening to block the merger, and the parties are in negotiations. Insiders are unable to predict whether a deal is within days or whether it will fall apart completely. Google spent nearly $12 million on in-house lobbying around anti-trust, privacy, and competition among other issues between 2008-2010. The company spent an additional $5.4 million on retained firms over the same time period.
Though Google contends that it does not intend to set prices or sell tickets, and that its acquisition will make airfare searches easier and drive “more potential customers to airlines’ and online travel agencies’ websites,” Bing, which is in direct competition with Google, relies on the software for its travel site as well.
Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.) wrote to Attorney General Christine A. Varney last year from his position on the Antitrust subcommittee to outline concerns over competition and antitrust issues raised by the acquisition, and saying it “warrants a careful review.” Consumer Reports said it is “concerned that the Google-ITA acquisition has the potential to limit consumer choice in the already complex marketplace of online travel, particularly after such a deal were to be finalized.”
Tags: Department of Justice, Google, google acquisition, google merger, ITA
Posted in Government Relations Alert | Comments Off on Google, DOJ square off on acquisition
Monday, December 6th, 2010 by Vbhotla
Approximately 33% of freshman Congressmen in the 112th congressional session received donations from either Verizon, AT&T or both this campaign season, as the telecommunications carriers gear up for a big fight on net neutrality.
Groups on both sides of the Internet regulation issue have made a great number of lobbying contacts to Congressmen and FCC officials in anticipation of the Dec. 21 meeting to address regulation strategy. Google and Comcast were among other big donors, though their donation strategies differed from those of Verizon and AT&T, who supported candidates with little discretion at all, even, in some cases, opponents in the same race. Google’s support, for instance, was only for candidates with prior political experience, while Comcast targeted veterans it considers key players in the net neutrality battle.
The efforts are in response to FCC regulation over broadband access, following a decision by the DC Court of Appeals last spring which ruled the agency does not have the authority to regulate Internet service providers’ interference with web access. Despite the ruling, FCC chairman Julius Genachowski is expected to outline his new broadband plan Wednesday.
In response to challenges to his authority to act on the issue in light of the court ruling by ranking member Joe Barton (R-Texas) of the House Energy & Commerce Committee and a top member of its Internet subcommittee, Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) the New York Times reports that Genachowski “believes he has the legal authority to act because he argues that his plan would help spread broadband service more widely across the country, a priority that Congress has established as one of the F.C.C.’s mandates.”
Tags: at&t, broadband, broadband access, broadband plan, FCC, Google, net neutrality, network neutrality, regulatory authority, telecommuncations lobbying, verizon
Posted in Government Relations Alert | Comments Off on Telecomm industry embroiled in fight on net neutrality
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