i3 - September/October 2016 - 32

Policy
T EC H N E WS

Secretary of
Commerce
Penny Pritzker
Talks Trade

A

lthough United States
Secretary of Commerce
Penny Pritzker is an
heiress to the Hyatt Hotel
chain (Forbes estimated her net
worth at $2.4 billion in 2015),

32

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2016

Secretary Pritzker
at CES 2016.

Tell us about your role as the U.S.
Secretary of Commerce.
When I took this job, President Obama
asked me to serve as the voice of business
for the nation. While government alone
cannot create companies, jobs or economic output, it can help create the
conditions for the private sector to grow
and hire. To do that most effectively, the
public and private sectors must work
hand-in-hand.
The Department of Commerce is the
agency that is best equipped to serve the
U.S. business community, to function as
their voice in the federal government and
to provide leadership in setting objectives
and executing policies that create the
conditions for economic growth.
The Department of Commerce

provides the services needed by American
companies of all sizes to prosper in the
global economy, from issuing patents
and trademarks to issuing licenses to
sell sensitive technologies abroad; from
providing data on demographics, the
economy and the weather to providing
a common language that companies can
use to manage cyber risk; from investing
in advanced manufacturing clusters to
facilitating more foreign investment in
the U.S.; from linking minority-owned
businesses with the capital, contracts
and markets they need to grow to linking
communities across America through
expanded broadband access.
We craft the policies needed to both
keep America open for business and to
ensure that the world is open to America's
I T I S I N N O VAT I O N

FROM LEFT: CHRISTINA BEDELL; CHUCK KENNEDY/WHITE HOUSE

she is also an accomplished entrepreneur
who has founded multiple businesses and
been a board member for many others,
including Hyatt.
Her uncle founded the Hyatt Hotel
chain, which her father ran for 10 years
as president of the company. Pritzker was
also the chairman of the board at Hyatt
before becoming the 38th U.S. Secretary
of Commerce on June 26, 2013.
But it was Pritzker's work raising hundreds of millions of dollars in the 2008
presidential primaries for Senator Barack
Obama that propelled her Washington
career. She served as national co-chair
of Obama for America in 2012, on the
President's Economic Recovery Advisory
Board and the President's Council on
Jobs and Competitiveness. She was also
on the board of directors of the Council
on Foreign Relations, a think tank
focused on U.S. foreign policy.
As the head of the Department of
Commerce, her activities run the gamut
and include commercial issues for small
businesses, helping U.S. companies find
partnerships abroad and spearheading
research to help U.S. competitiveness.
She focuses on trade and investment,
supporting advanced manufacturing and
helping American companies export their
products overseas. i3 recently had the
opportunity to speak with her on issues
impacting consumer technology.
https://www.commerce.gov/directory/pennypritzker https://www.commerce.gov/directory/pennypritzker https://www.commerce.gov/directory/pennypritzker
i3 - September/October 2016

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