Google registers in-house lobbyists to represent views

Internet search company Google Inc. has registered in-house lobbyists for the first time.

Since establishing a Washington office in 2005, Google had used outside lobbying firms, including King & Spalding and Podesta Group, to represent its policy interests.

Technology companies in general have been slow to recognize the need to lobby Capitol Hill, experts said, and they also spend less than other heavily regulated industries, such as oil and gas, telecommunications and pharmaceuticals.

Adam Kovacevich, a spokesman for Google, which spent $580,000 in the first six months of 2007 to lobby the federal government, cited several issues that prompted the company to register, including privacy, online child safety and “network neutrality,” the principle that Internet sites should be equally accessible to all Web users.

Mountain View, Calif.-based Google also is considering bidding $4.6 billion in a federal auction of wireless airwaves early next year.

Among its newly registered lobbyists are Alan Davidson, its senior policy counsel, who launched the Washington office; Rick Whitt, the company’s media and telecommunications counsel; Johanna Shelton, former counsel to the House Energy and Commerce Committee; and Pablo Chavez, who was chief counsel to Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), a presidential contender.