Contact Thomas Lapping

Selected by eSchool News as one of the 30 most influential leaders on the use of technology in the nation’s schools – a list that also includes Bill Gates and Michael Dell – Thomas Lapping has more than 20 years of management, sales, and marketing experience with technology-related services, especially their delivery to the U.S. education market.

Mr. Lapping founded JDL Horizons in August 2007 through the acquisition of two operating divisions, Professional Staff Development and Video Distribution, from JDL Technologies.

Mr. Lapping had founded JDL Technologies in 1989 as a K-12 education networking company, and led it through the delivery of over 5,000 IP networks in K-20 institutions. In 1998, he merged JDL Technologies with Communications Systems, Inc. (CSI – AMEX: JCS) and served CSI as President and CEO of JDL Technologies up to the founding of JDL Horizons.

Previously, Mr. Lapping was National Education Sales Manager for Control Data’s Plato Education Services, Minneapolis, MN, one of the original organizations to develop and validate the power of computer-based learning in business and industry.

He also was Director of Marketing, Education, for Corvus Systems, San Jose, CA, providing network solutions to the K–12 and university markets. In that role, he implemented a national education program that delivered 11,000 networks and servers.

In 1996, Mr. Lapping was the Steering Committee Chair for NetDay Minnesota, the forerunner of what came to be known as the E-Rate program, which makes discounts available to eligible schools and libraries for telecommunication services, Internet access, and internal connections. E-Rate is now administered by the Universal Service Administrative Company (USAC), an independent, not-for-profit corporation designated as the administrator of the federal Universal Service Fund by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Mr. Lapping is a founding member and serves as Director on the Board of the E-Rate Service Providers Association (ESPA).

A 1981 graduate of St. Cloud State University, St. Cloud, MN, Mr. Lapping makes his home in the Minneapolis suburb of Minnetonka.