Robin Foster has occupied several board-level strategy and policy positions in the UK media and telecommunications sectors and is currently an independent adviser on regulatory, policy and strategic issues.  

Robin was part of the first senior team at the then newly-established regulator, Ofcom, as Partner, Strategy and Market Developments, where he led the first Ofcom review of public service broadcasting. His previous senior positions include director of strategy and regulation at the Independent Television Commission, director of strategy at the BBC, and director of economic consultants NERA, where he was responsible for a range of projects on privatisation, regulation and spectrum management.

Since leaving Ofcom, Robin has advised government in two roles: as a member of the UK Digital Britain Steering Board, which developed proposals for UK broadband communications sector policy and regulation and as one of the independent advisers to the UK Convergence Think Tank. He also ran the Global Communications Consortium research programme at London Business School until March 2008, and was Research Fellow at Bournemouth Media School from 2000 to 2002 where he led a programme of research into the future of media regulation in the UK ("Future Reflections").

Robin’s many publications include a recent pamphlet for the Social Market Foundation which highlighted the role of broadband policy and regulation as a priority for the UK, and a report for DCMS on Future Broadcasting Regulation. He is currently undertaking research for the Reuters Institute of Journalism into aspects of local media provision.