Bryan co-founded Polaris Consulting, LLC in January 2009 after extensive experience in the public and private sectors. Located on Capitol Hill, Polaris is regarded as one of the most effective advocacy organizations in Washington, providing its clients with unparalleled access, information, and proactive solutions to complex legislative and regulatory issues with a particular emphasis on representing clients before the Judiciary, Commerce and Finance Committees. Polaris was ranked third of all Washington lobbying firms in 2015 by Bloomberg Government.
Cunningham also specializes in advising clients during large/complex transactions before the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and U.S. Senate. Since 2009, Cunningham advised AT&T during the AT&T-T-Mobile merger, Verizon during the Verizon-Cable spectrum merger, Microsoft during the FTC investigation of Google, AT&T during the AT&T-DirecTV merger, Comcast during the Comcast-Time Warner merger, Charter during the Charter-Time Warner merger, Cigna during the Anthem-Cigna merger, and the National Beer Wholesalers Association during the Anheuser Bush/InBev-SAB MillerCoors merger. Polaris continues to represent many of these clients post-transaction.
Prior to entering the private sector, Cunningham spent many years working in senior positions on Capitol Hill, in both the U.S. House and Senate. During his tenure in government, Cunningham was successful in passing several pieces of legislation that were signed into law by the President. Cunningham left government service to become an in-house lobbyist for Cisco Systems, where he represented the company before members of Congress and the U.S. Senate on a wide range of issues. He also worked at one of Washington’s top law firms before co-founding Polaris in 2009. Cunningham remains active in electoral politics, and has worked on two presidential campaigns. Bryan holds a B.A. from Utah State University, a J.D. from the Catholic University of America Columbus School of Law, and has been an Adjunct Professor at the George Washington University Graduate School of Political Management, where he taught courses on Executive-Legislative Process and Interest Group Politics.