Andrew Rhodes, former Chief Executive Officer of the Great Britain Gambling Commission, has joined betting industry-focused international strategic advisory firm Hawkbridge.

The confirmation of Rhodes’ next career move comes just over a month after he vacated the leadership role at the Gambling Commission, though his departure was initially announced back in February.

It’s not exactly been a secret that Hawkbridge was Rhodes’ next stop, however.

In March, Sky News reported that Rhodes was in talks to join the London-headquartered advisory, with the Commission sharing that “Andrew has told us he is going to work within the wider sector and has been open with us about his plans”.

Confirming Rhodes’ employment with the firm three months later, Hawkbridge said this week that its new consultant will advise on international regulatory strategy, government and regulatory engagement, governance and operational standards.

“Hawkbridge was established to give operators, suppliers, investors and boards sharp, pragmatic counsel on the questions that sit above legal advice and beyond commercial diligence,” said Bahar Alaeddini, Hawkbridge co-founder.

The Rhodes from the Commission to Hawkbridge

Given Rhodes’ five-year stint as Commission CEO, the areas that he will be tasked with advising on at Hawkbridge are certainly ones he has a lot of experience in.

Rhodes took the helm at the Commission in the midst of the review into the 2005 Gambling Act. He joined in June 2021, with the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) having begun the review in December 2020.

Rhodes replaced Neil McArthur as Commission CEO amidst political scrutiny of the regulator’s handling of the collapse of the Football Index. Reports at the time alleged that the Commission had been warned about Football Index’s business model prior to its collapse.

The Gambling Act review was easily the most defining development of Rhodes’ tenure with the Commission, however. The three year process concluded with a White Paper published by DCMS in April 2023, and saw extensive public debate around gambling and its societal impact. 

Major topics of conversation included:

• Customer affordability, and the introduction of some kind of ‘affordability check’ to safeguard this
• Sponsorship and advertising, with many gambling reform advocates calling for a complete ban on sports sponsorship
• Funding for gambling harms treatment, research and education
• Cross-selling and bonusing

These remain heated talking points in the political and regulatory discussions around UK gambling to this day. Affordability, for example, has been discussed extensively over the past month.

The Commission is still yet to make a decision on when or whether to introduce Financial Risk Assessments (FRAs) – the more stringent form of affordability check, the more ‘light touch’ Vulnerability Checks having been introduced in February last year.

The absence of permanent leadership at the Commission may have played a part in the delay here, though it is under the interim leadership of Sarah Gardner, Acting CEO and former Deputy CEO. Gardner was also Acting CEO in between McArthur and Rhodes during 2020-2021.

Aside from the Gambling Act review, Rhodes also oversaw the fourth National Lottery Licence contest. The tender concluded with the awarding of the contract to Allwyn in March 2022, the first time the contract has been held by anyone other than Camelot UK since the lottery was established in 1993.

The Commission’s decision led to legal challenges from Camelot UK, IGT, and Richard Desmond’s New Lottery Corporation. Camelot’s claims were dropped in September 2022 and IGT’s in July 2024, while the High Court ruled in favour of the Commission and Allwyn against Richard Desmond last month.

Rhodes’ tenure with the Commission was eventful, to say the least. 

An irony to some UK stakeholders may be that he will now be consulting on how to navigate regulatory frameworks and policies that came into effect under his regulatory leadership, such as affordability measures and the April 2025 ban on cross-selling bonuses.

“The next five years will be more consequential for gambling regulation than we have seen in many years, and even more so than I saw as Chief Executive of the Gambling Commission in the previous five years,” Rhodes remarked.

“This brings uncharted challenges for boards, investors and leaders. I have decided to join the founders of Hawkbridge for a simple reason: there has rarely been a single source of regulatory, commercial and operational advice at such a senior and experienced level available to the sector. 

“The best counsel draws on every vantage point, operator, adviser and regulator alike, which is why I am so pleased to bring my own experience to Hawkbridge.”