Illustration: Tiffany Herring/Axios
IBM's lead on global government and regulatory affairs Chris Padilla announced in June that he was retiring, so we sat down with him to discuss where the company and the country is headed.
Why it matters: The world is figuring out how to regulate emerging technologies, and the U.S. is fighting to remain competitive.
- IBM is one of the loudest voices in shaping regulation as many in the private sector are trying to influence the government's approach.
- With Padilla's 15 years of experience gone, the company has a major gap to fill.
Below is an excerpt from the conversation, which has been edited and condensed for clarity.
How has IBM changed in the 15 years that you were there?
Hugely. It's a completely different company. When I came to IBM, hardware was still a much bigger part of the company's revenue and profitability. No one knew what the cloud was. Now we are a hybrid cloud and AI company.
- One of the good things about IBM is it has shown throughout 113 years that it can transform itself by getting out of commoditizing businesses and getting into new, emerging businesses.
- We're a leader on quantum. It's the next big thing in computing and IBM will be a big part of that and that's really cool.
What lessons have you learned from your time at IBM?
It's not about who you know. It's about what you get done.
- Meeting presidents and royalty and rock stars, it's kind of cool. But the question is, what did you get done that mattered for the company or for countries where you've been working?
Is there anything that you would have done differently?
I would do more to break down internal barriers and to empower the team.
- Fighting for more resources and more freedom for people to do their advocacy. If I have any regrets, it's that I sometimes didn't win those internal battles.
Are you generally optimistic or concerned about the future of tech regulation?
I'm generally optimistic, because when I came into this role 15 years ago there wasn't as much appreciation of the need for what I'll call global consistency of regulation.
- Now I think there's a recognition, whether it's on semiconductors or quantum or AI, that there needs to be much more international cooperation and that doesn't mean global regulation.
How do you see tech policy being impacted by a change in administration?
It'll be the same points we advocate now. We'll have to advocate them to different people, and we'll have to build different relationships, but the points won't be much different.
- There might be a difference of emphasis, right? Depending on who wins or what the makeup is, you might put more emphasis on skills or you might put more emphasis on taxes.
What has your experience been like when you meet with other world leaders working under a Trump administration versus a Biden one?
I'm thinking of a meeting I had with a prominent Japanese politician earlier this year where the discussion was mostly about the Biden administration's trade policy, or lack thereof.
- This Japanese official was saying, "Why isn't the Biden administration supporting digital trade? We, the government of Japan, have taken the lead role on digital trade and we can't get the U.S. to support us. It's like the world is turned upside down."
- And I will share my candid views with these folks. I've never felt embarrassed, though, to have a discussion with a foreign leader about what's going on in the U.S., and that was even true during the Trump years.
- There's a lot of uncertainty about what a second Trump term would do. Will he pull out of NATO? Will he continue to support Ukraine? What's going to happen to our economic relationship with China? But there continues to be uncertainty about the Biden administration. Are they ever going to do anything on trade or economic openness?
