Former FCC Chair Julius Genachowski is joining the Carlyle group, a private equity firm. The company announced today that it was bringing on Genachowski as a partner and managing director of its US buyouts team, working on investments with technology, media, and telecommunications companies, including internet and mobile businesses. Genachowski, appointed as FCC head in 2009 by President Obama, helped regulate these sectors for several years; during his tenure, he presided over several major mergers, allowing Comcast and NBC Universal to merge but blocking an AT&T buyout of T-Mobile. His policy goals focused on creating a nationwide broadband network and developing net neutrality rules for internet service providers.

While Genachowski worked at the FCC in the 1990s, he spent the decade before his chair appointment in private industry. He joined media magnate Barry Diller's company IAC in 1997, starting as general counsel before becoming chief of business operations. He left in 2005, becoming an advisor to the General Atlantic equity firm and co-founding tech incubator LaunchBox Digital. Since stepping down as FCC chair in mid-2013, Genachowski has so far taken teaching and advisory roles, leading a course based on his FCC experience at Harvard's schools of business and law and joining the Aspen Institute think-tank as a senior fellow.