With White House CTO's Departure, Industry Looks for Signals

The White House announced Chopra's departure on Friday, but did not say why he is leaving or what his plans are. TechAmerica's acting President Dan Varroney said Chopra's belief in the "transformative nature of technology" allowed him to forge effective public-private collaboration. The tech industry will be looking to engage with the next CTO on similarly effective partnerships, he said.

"As the federal government's first Chief Technology Officer, Aneesh Chopra did groundbreaking work to bring our government into the 21st century," Obama said in a statement. He credited Chopra with finding innovative ways to use technology to engage Americans...

In the end, Chopra wasn't appointed to a cabinet-level office, but the tech industry appreciated his mandate to promote innovation and technology as ways to solve the country's problems...