Julius Genachowski was sworn in today as chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, beginning a tenure that is expected to bring more attention to new mobile and Internet technologies.

Genachowski also announced his key staff, stressing the private and public sector experience they will bring to the agency. Genachowski has been widely lauded for his experience in Washington as an entrepreneur and later as an investor. He served two clerkships and as general counsel for former FCC chairman Reed Hundt. Later he became an executive for IAC/InterActive, which bought several Internet firms, and founder of LaunchBox Digital and venture capital firm Rock Creek Ventures.

"The FCC should be a model of excellence in government," Genachowski said. "The agency will benefit enormously from their leadership, from their private and public sector experience . . ."

He chose as his chief of staff, Edward Lazarus, a relative unknown in the telecommunications industry. Lazarus comes from the law firm Akin Gump, where he supervised the Los Angeles office of 800 employees and was the co-head of the firm's global litigation practice.

Genachowski also appointed two senior advisors.

Colin Crowell, a veteran telecommunications aide for Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass), will be a strategic advisor to the chairman, who will oversee communications, legislative and intergovernmental affairs. The role, which is a newly created focus for the chairman's office, indicates an emphasis on relations between the FCC and other agencies and the FCC's relationship with members on Capitol Hill. President Obama has stressed the importance of broadband Internet development as a tool for solving problems in education, healthcare and other areas and the FCC has been charged with coming up with a plan by next summer to bring high-speed Internet to all Americans. Crowell, who worked for Markey for more than 20 years, helped craft the clause in the stimulus plan that assigns the FCC its mandate for a national broadband Internet plan.

The other senior advisor, Bruce Gottleib, comes from Commissioner Michael J. Copps' office, where he specialized in wireless Internet and public safety issues. Gottleib will be Genachowski's senior legal advisor and will manage the agency's overall agenda and coordinate policy between the FCC's bureaus.

Genachowski has several issues lined up for his start. He will have to come up with a national broadband plan that not only connects all homes to high-speed Internet but also addresses issues of affordability and lack of training on how to use the Web. Public interest groups and small telecommunications firms, meanwhile, have pushed for reforms that would increase competition. Genachowski has promised Senate Commerce Committee leaders he will review a complaint by rural wireless carriers that exclusive deals between large carriers and handset makers are anticompetitive.

Telecom analyst Blair Levin, a technology adviser for President Obama during his presidential campaign and transition, will be heading to the Federal Communications Commission to help coordinate the agency's national broadband plan.

The FCC made the announcement in a release today. Levin, a managing director at Stifel Nicolaus, is a telecom policy veteran who served as chief of staff for former FCC chairman Reed Hundt between 1993 and 1997, when the commission was charged with implementing the 1996 Telecom Act.

Levin worked closely with Julius Genachowski, Obama's pick to chair the FCC, on Obama's tech strategy during the campaign and transition, which led to the inclusion of broadband network projects in the economic stimulus plan. Levin returns to the FCC as Obama pledges to make broadband, or high-speed, Internet policy available to all Americans and use it to help spur economic growth.

As part of Obama's Recovery Act, or stimulus plan, the FCC was charged to come up with a strategy in one year to make broadband accessible to all households. The FCC is charged to also address questions of how to make broadband service available to those who can't afford it and to figure out ways to train people with computer use and Web access. In addition, Congress has allocated $7.2 billion in broadband deployment grants to companies to bring access to rural and underserved areas.

President Obama today nominated Robert McDowell, a Republican commissioner at the Federal Communications Commission, to serve another term at the watchdog agency.

The nomination leaves one remaining open seat at the FCC, which is expected to be filled by former Commerce Department official Meredith Atwell Baker, a Republican.

The Senate is expected to hold a hearing on Obama's pick to lead the agency, Julius Genachowski, later this month along with McDowell.

McDowell came to the agency in 2006 after serving two decades at telecom trade groups. He has pushed for free market principles and deregulation and differed with former Republican FCC Chairman Kevin J. Martin on a ruling against Comcast's network management practices that blocked video application BitTorrent.

McDowell's chief of staff, Angela Giancarlo, didn't immediately return a request for an interview.

Disagreements between Martin and McDowell began just after his arrival at the FCC, when McDowell removed himself from a vote on the merger between AT&T and BellSouth, citing a conflict of interest because of his lobbying background for the telecommunications firms. By recusing himself from the vote, the approval became harder for the agency that at the time had three Republican commissioners and two Democrats.

"While we have not always agreed on every issue, we feel that Commissioner McDowell's understanding of industry investment dynamics, as well as his experience with the many complex issues facing the telecommunications sector, will be of value to the new FCC," said Jim Cicconi, AT&T's head of external and legislative affairs.

A senate confirmation hearing for President Obama's pick to head the Federal Communications Commission is expected to occur by the middle of this month as it appeared Republican leaders in the Senate have agreed on their picks for two spots in the five-commission agency, according to sources close to the process.

Merideth Attwell Baker the former acting head of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration and daughter-in-law of former Secretary of State James Baker, is expected to be nominated to a vacant Republican seat at the FCC. Current Republican FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell is also expected to be nominated for another term at the agency.

In March, Obama picked Julius Genachowski, the president's head tech advisor and law school classmate, to chair the federal government's agency that oversees fleeting expletives and wardrobe malfunctions on television, wireless competition, media ownership rules and broadband Internet policies. Genachowski's Senate confirmation hearing was delayed until after Memorial Day weekend as Republican lawmakers were deadlocked over candidates to fill an open Rebublican seat at the FCC. They wanted to time Genachowski's hearing with that of a Republican pick, according to sources close to the process.

Obama has also nominated South Carolina public utilitites commissioner Mignon Clyburn to take over a Democratic spot at the FCC that will be vacated by Jonathan Adelstein. Adelstein was appointed to lead a $2.5 billion broadband Internet grants program at the Agriculture Department.

Some sources say telephone giant AT&T had pushed Republican lawmakers in the Senate to pick a replacement for Commissioner McDowell who had recused himself from a vote for the merger of AT&T and Bell South in 2006. McDowell is a former telecom lobbyist for trade group Comptel and removed himself from the merger vote citing a conflict of interest.

Verizon Communications' biggest fear from Washington regulators:New rules on net neutrality that would prevent the company from charging more for consuming more data and providing extra services on their network.

Ivan Seidenberg, Verizon's chief executive, talked about the prospect of such rules yesterday in a broad-ranging conversation with reporters and the editorial board of The Washington Post. He also said exclusive phone contracts can spur innovation and that the firm's biggest high-tech foe these days is Google.

Google has pushed for net neutrality regulation, which would prevent network operators like Verizon, AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile from controlling the flow of Internet traffic on their network. Google and some public interest groups argue that consumers should have unfettered access to the Web traffic and not be treated differently by how much data they consume. For Google, greater and free flow of Internet traffic only helps their business, which dominates the online search market.

Verizon opposes such regulation, saying not all data are equal and that consumers who consume more bandwidth through downloads of big video files, for example, shouldn't be charged the same as lighter Internet users. It also wants to reserve the option of providing premium services like a protected network for banks and their consumers, for example.

Seidenberg said Google "wants for us not to be able to differentiate but set a standard that would shift all costs of building a network to us and so that we are treated as the lowest denominator common carrier.

"So if you listen to the west coast crowd, they are trying to effectively quarantine what our permissible activities are," he said.

President Obama said during his election campaign that net neutrality would be a priority for his technology agenda. It's unclear, however, if the Federal Communications Commission would adopt new policies or maintain current principles that forbid discrimination of traffic by network operators.

Seidenberg wouldn't say whether Verizon is in negotiation with Apple for an iPhone to work on the company's broadband wireless network scheduled to launch at the middle of next year. He said Apple never considered a partnership with Verizon because it only wanted to create a chip for its phone that operated on the GSM wireless technology. Verizon operates on a different platform called CDMA.

But for the next generation network, he said, "Our view is that they would take another look at it."