Silicon Valley lobby group draws critics

It is said to have a $1 million joining fee and boasts some of technology’s biggest names among its members – including its founder, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg. But Silicon Valley’s latest attempt to form a lobbying group has been attacked by rivals in the tech sector as an interference in politics that risks attracting negative publicity.

The new organization, to be formally launched in the next few days, marks the first major super-Pac – or political action group – to emerge from the tech industry. Starting out with what insiders estimate will be $20 - $25 million in seed money from Zuckerberg, it is set to become Silicon Valley’s richest lobby group, with a total fundraising target of $50 million. As its first cause, the as-yet unnamed alliance has taken up immigration reform in order to boost the flow of engineers and other skilled workers to the US. But critics at tech companies not involved in the group warn that it risks drawing negative attention to the extreme wealth of some of its backers as well as attracting the sort of accusations of arrogance and naivety that have accompanied some earlier Silicon Valley attempts to shape policy debates in Washington.