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Chair’s Blog: Previewing the May Board Workshop

30 April 2025
By
Tripti Sinha

Tripti Sinha

ICANN Board Chair

Tripti Sinha is the President and CEO of Internet2, where she champions the organization’s core mission of enabling U.S. higher education and research institutions to collaborate on mission-critical technology services and emerging technologies. Internet2 also works with global National Research and Education Networks (NRENs). Sinha has over three decades of progressive experience in Internet and Cyber-Infrastructure technologies. Her experience spans leadership roles in engineering, operations, finance, governance, advocacy, and policy.

Before joining Internet2, Tripti held two leadership roles at the University of Maryland: Assistant Vice President and Chief Technology Officer and Executive Director of the Mid-Atlantic Crossroads (MAX), a regional research and education network. In these roles, she supported advanced, high-performance networking and research technologies, including GPU compute infrastructure optimized for AI workloads and investigating evolving quantum networking technologies.

She has served on many non-profit and private sector technology advisory boards, and was past Chair of The Quilt’s Board of Directors and former Co-Chair of ICANN’s Root Server System Advisory Committee.

Tripti has a Computer Science degree from Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts and did graduate work in Computer Science at the University of Maryland. She holds executive education certificates from Harvard Kennedy School in Public Leadership and Policy, and in Global Innovation and Execution from Stanford University. She was born in India and lives in the United States. As a child and young adult, Tripti moved back-and-forth between the U.S. and India which gave her an appreciation for global pluralism. She is proficient in English and Hindi, and understands Punjabi, Urdu and the ancient Sanskrit language. Sinha has a keen interest in Information and Communication Technology innovation, entrepreneurship, governance and policy, and international affairs.

Tripti was nominated to serve on the ICANN Board of Directors by the Nominating Committee in 2018. Her term will expire at the Annual General Meeting 2027.

After a productive March Board Workshop and ICANN82, the ICANN Board is planning to continue progressing its work at its next workshop this week.

Taking place 2–4 May, the May Board Workshop is being held in Hanoi, Việt Nam, ahead of the Contracted Parties Summit and the APAC DNS Forum, which includes the main Universal Acceptance Day 2025 event. My Board colleagues and I look forward to engaging with ICANN's contracted parties and domain industry leaders at these events. As part of this engagement, the chairs of the Registrars Stakeholder Group and the Registries Stakeholder Group will give a presentation during the Board Workshop on key issues facing the contracted parties.

Here is an overview of the other key focus areas of the May Board Workshop:

Finance and Planning: Following a Public Comment proceeding and the recommendation of the Board Finance Committee, the Board will consider adopting the ICANN Budget for fiscal year 2026 (FY26), the ICANN FY26–30 Operating and Financial Plan and FY26 Operating Plan, and the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority FY26 Operating Plan and Budget. If you missed the webinar on Monday that provided an overview of the latest draft operating and financial plans, a recording is available on the Finance and Planning Community Group Workspace.

Reviews: In April 2024, the Board took action to defer the Fourth Accountability and Transparency Review (ATRT4) for 12 months to allow implementation of the ATRT3 recommendations to progress. At ICANN82, the ICANN community expressed interest in taking steps to reflect and reimagine how we might achieve the objectives of Reviews going forward. Since then, the Board has been considering the community's input on ICANN's readiness for ATRT4 and the importance of review mechanisms that are fit for purpose. We are aiming to conclude that discussion at this workshop to put a plan into action.

Next Round: The Board will receive an update on the status of implementing the New gTLD Program: Next Round, consider approval of the next funding tranche, and review several other budget-related topics, such as how to address a potential deficit or excess for the program. The Board will also consider the next steps to close out the remaining applications from the 2012 round and the next round vendor strategy. In addition, the Board will receive a briefing on the use of sponsored and community top-level domains.

ICP-2: The Board will receive an update on the progress of the Address Supporting Organization's development of a successor document for Internet Coordination Policy 2 (ICP-2). The outcome of this work will bring greater accountability to the Regional Internet Registry system. I encourage the ICANN community to participate in the ongoing Public Comment proceeding.

RSS GWG: Two Board liaisons participated in the recent workshop of the Root Server System Governance Working Group (RSS GWG). They will facilitate a discussion about the emerging draft report, which will be published for Public Comment soon. This work affirms ICANN's mission to facilitate the coordination of the operation and evolution of the Root Server System.

Internet Governance: The Board will discuss recent activities related to the 20-year review of the World Summit on the Information Society outcomes (WSIS+20), as well as ICANN's engagement strategy and goals. Moreover, the Board will be briefed on the upcoming key events, including the 2025 Internet Governance Forum and the International Telecommunication Union's WSIS+20 High-Level Event.

Risk Assessment: The Board Risk Committee will deliver its semiannual report to the Board, per the ICANN Risk Management Framework.

As always, the workshop will conclude with a Regular Board Meeting, the agenda for which is available on the Board Activities and Meetings page. After the workshop, I will share another blog with a summary of the key outcomes. In the meantime, I hope to see many of you next week online or in Hanoi!

Authors

Tripti Sinha

Tripti Sinha

ICANN Board Chair
Tripti Sinha

Tripti Sinha

ICANN Board Chair

Tripti Sinha is the President and CEO of Internet2, where she champions the organization’s core mission of enabling U.S. higher education and research institutions to collaborate on mission-critical technology services and emerging technologies. Internet2 also works with global National Research and Education Networks (NRENs). Sinha has over three decades of progressive experience in Internet and Cyber-Infrastructure technologies. Her experience spans leadership roles in engineering, operations, finance, governance, advocacy, and policy.

Before joining Internet2, Tripti held two leadership roles at the University of Maryland: Assistant Vice President and Chief Technology Officer and Executive Director of the Mid-Atlantic Crossroads (MAX), a regional research and education network. In these roles, she supported advanced, high-performance networking and research technologies, including GPU compute infrastructure optimized for AI workloads and investigating evolving quantum networking technologies.

She has served on many non-profit and private sector technology advisory boards, and was past Chair of The Quilt’s Board of Directors and former Co-Chair of ICANN’s Root Server System Advisory Committee.

Tripti has a Computer Science degree from Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts and did graduate work in Computer Science at the University of Maryland. She holds executive education certificates from Harvard Kennedy School in Public Leadership and Policy, and in Global Innovation and Execution from Stanford University. She was born in India and lives in the United States. As a child and young adult, Tripti moved back-and-forth between the U.S. and India which gave her an appreciation for global pluralism. She is proficient in English and Hindi, and understands Punjabi, Urdu and the ancient Sanskrit language. Sinha has a keen interest in Information and Communication Technology innovation, entrepreneurship, governance and policy, and international affairs.

Tripti was nominated to serve on the ICANN Board of Directors by the Nominating Committee in 2018. Her term will expire at the Annual General Meeting 2027.

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