Trump praises tech leaders for 'incredible innovation'
- Published
Mr Trump vows to bring fair trade deals to Silicon Valley
US President-elect Donald Trump has lavished praise on technology titans' "incredible innovation" during a summit at Trump Tower.
Hosting with three of his children - Donald Jr, Eric and Ivanka - Mr Trump told the executives he would make trading across borders "a lot easier".
Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Apple's Tim Cook, Tesla's Elon Musk and Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg attended.
Paypal founder Peter Thiel, a member of Mr Trump's team, was also there.
Mr Thiel, who has been a vocal Trump ally and spoke about his nomination at the Republican National Convention this summer, is expected to act as the bridge between the new administration and tech leaders.
Throughout his campaign to be elected president, Mr Trump put technology companies and their executives in the firing line, with calls for boycotts and accusations of tax-dodging.
But the president-elect was cordial on Wednesday, telling his guests he was "here to help you folks to do well".
"We want you to keep going with the incredible innovation. There's nobody like you in the world," he said.
"You'll call my people, you'll call me, it doesn't make any difference. We have no formal chain of command around here."
Mr Trump also told the group that technology companies benefited from a "bounce" after his election, adding "everybody in this room has to like me at least a little bit".
The president-elect struck a positive tone with industry leaders despite bashing companies like Apple and Amazon throughout his campaign for sending jobs offshore and their stance on encryption.
Earlier this year, more than 140 tech leaders from Silicon Valley signed an open letter, external arguing against Mr Trump's candidacy, warning the New York billionaire "would be a disaster for innovation".
Notably absent from Wednesday's meeting was Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey.