He initially wrote software for process control systems and later served as the head of the networking group from 1985 to 1996, working alongside Robert Cailliau and Tim Berners-Lee, who invented the World Wide Web.

[3][4] He took three years off of his CERN career to teach undergraduate computer science at Massey University in New Zealand.

From 1999 to 2001 he was at iCAIR, international Center for Advanced Internet Research, sponsored by IBM at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.

In September 2007, Carpenter left IBM for academia, teaching data communication at the University of Auckland,[2] from 2007 until his retirement in 2012.

[6] Carpenter's research interests include Internet protocols, especially the networking and routing layers.