Robert Pepper | Senior Fellow
Global Digital Inclusion Partnership (GDIP)

Robert Pepper is a Senior Fellow at the Global Digital Inclusion Partnership (GDIP) where he advises governments, international organizations, private sector players and NGOs
on connectivity and infrastructure technology, trends and policy. Before joining GDIP, Pepper helped lead Meta’s connectivity and technology policy activities focusing on new technology development, deployment and adoption including teams designing and deploying global subsea, terrestrial fiber optic and edge networks as well as mobile and wireless technologies. Before joining Meta, Pepper was Cisco’s Vice President for Global Technology Policy for more than a decade working with governments across the world helping them develop their digital strategies and address areas such as ICT and development, broadband plans, IP enabled services, wireless and spectrum policy, the Internet of Things, security, privacy as well as Internet Governance.
Pepper was Chief of the Office of Plans and Policy and Chief of Policy Development at the US Federal Communications Commission for 16 years beginning in 1989 where he helped develop policies promoting the development of the Internet, as well as leading teams designing and implementing the first U.S. spectrum auctions, implementing telecommunications competition, and planning for the transition to digital television.  Pepper’s government service also included Acting Associate Administrator at the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) and initiating a program on Computers, Communications and Information Policy at the National Science Foundation.
His academic appointments included faculty positions at the Universities of Iowa, Indiana, and Pennsylvania, and as a research affiliate at Harvard University. He is a board member of the Pacific Telecommunications Council and the UK’s OFCOM Spectrum Advisory Board.  He has been on the boards of the Internet Society, the U.S. Telecommunications Training Institute the U.S. Department of State’s Advisory Committee on International Communications and Information Policy and the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Spectrum Management Advisory Committee.  He also is on advisory boards at Columbia University, the University of Wisconsin and Michigan State University.
Pepper received his BA. and Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.