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Google Testing the Waters in Cuba

By Nancy Scola

The goal of the AS/COA trip is to give these companies a nuanced perspective of what’s taking place on the island, comments AS/COA’s Alana Tummino.

A Google executive is headed to Cuba this weekend to explore bringing better Internet access to the island, and the search giant has made a related proposal to the Cuban government, according to a State Department official.

It’s the latest sign that U.S. tech companies are testing the seriousness of Cuba’s interest in opening up to outside investment after President Barack Obama’s announcement of a historic thaw in relations and the Raúl Castro-led government’s recent pledge to bring Internet access to all Cubans by 2020.

The Google executive, Brett Perlmutter, is a New York-based member of the company’s Google Ideas unit aimed at helping to solve the world’s biggest tech problems. He’s taking part in a five-day trip to Havana with about a dozen other U.S. business representatives and “will focus on helping the Cuban government think through their publicly-stated goal of improving Internet access,” a company spokesperson said.

....Perlmutter and others are on the trip are scheduled to attend a variety of meetings, including with officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, local entrepreneurs, economists from the University of Havana’s Center for the Study of the Cuban Economy, and representatives of ETECSA, Cuba’s government-owned telecom. One goal is “to give these companies a nuanced perspective of what’s taking place on the island,” said Alana Tummino, director of policy at the Council of the Americas, who is leading the trip.

This won’t be the first trip by a Google executive to Cuba. Eric Schmidt, the company’s executive chairman, visited the island last summer. After that, Google began offering Cubans its lightweight Chrome Web browser....

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