NextFin News - Ofcom’s new chair has started a review that points to a harder truth than a simple management rethink: the UK’s communications regulator may now be carrying more statutory work than its current operating model can comfortably absorb. Sir Ian Cheshire has said the watchdog needs more resources as it takes on a wider brief and plays a bigger role in overseeing Big Tech. The issue is no longer whether Ofcom wants to act. It is whether the institution has enough capacity to enforce what Parliament has already asked it to do.
That tension sits at the centre of the story. Ofcom’s Board page says the Board provides strategic direction for the organisation, while the regulator’s 2026/27 plan of work says Ofcom has taken on the role of online safety regulator under the Online Safety Act 2023 and is working with the Competition and Markets Authority on digital markets, including designation decisions and remedies for search and mobile platforms. The same plan says Ofcom must have regard to promoting economic growth, which shows how the regulator is being pulled between tougher enforcement and the need to preserve competition and investment.
The workload is not theoretical. Ofcom’s online safety industry bulletin in January 2025 said the UK’s online safety regime was now in force and that sites and apps must act to better protect users online, especially children. By March 2026, the plan of work still described the regime as something the regulator was embedding, while also setting out further work on digital markets. That sequence matters because it shows a regulator still building out one regime while being asked to oversee another.
On digital markets, the shift is from broad policy intent to operational supervision. Ofcom’s 2026/27 plan says it is supporting the CMA’s implementation of the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act in relation to search and mobile platforms. That places the regulator closer to the product and distribution decisions that shape how large technology groups reach users. In practice, the issue is not just whether Big Tech faces fines. It is whether the rules alter the way companies design products, manage default settings, and allocate engineering and legal resources.
That is why the review matters to investors, companies and policymakers alike. A regulator that cannot keep up may produce a different kind of risk from a regulator that is simply aggressive. Instead of a one-off headline penalty, firms face a heavier compliance load, slower decisions and more uncertainty around what will be enforced and when. For markets, the real question is whether oversight becomes a steady operating cost rather than an occasional shock.
In that sense, Cheshire’s review reads less like an internal clean-up and more like a capacity test. If the state expands a regulator’s duties faster than it expands the institution that carries them, the result is not just more rules; it is weaker execution. That is the burden sitting behind the headline.
Why The Capacity Problem Looks Structural, Not Cyclical
The need for more resources looks structural, not cyclical. Cyclical pressures usually ease when a backlog clears or demand normalises. Ofcom’s problem is different because the additional work is written into the remit itself. The 2026/27 plan says the regulator has taken on online safety duties under the Online Safety Act 2023, already regulates premium rate services under the Regulation of Premium Rate Services Order 2024, and is working on digital markets with the CMA. Those are recurring supervisory functions, not temporary projects.
The difference matters because the latest phase of regulation is not just broader; it is more technically demanding. Online safety requires systems for risk assessment, content moderation, age assurance, transparency and enforcement. Digital markets brings in search and mobile remedies, conduct requirements and ongoing coordination with another competition authority. Each area calls for specialist staff, legal work and monitoring infrastructure. A single institution has to do all of that at once, and that raises the odds that capacity becomes the bottleneck.
The market may be underestimating the second-order effect. More Ofcom capacity does not simply mean more enforcement against Big Tech. It also means a more predictable compliance regime. That can lower uncertainty for smaller services and advertisers, but it raises the operating burden on large platforms that have to document processes, test safeguards and prepare for more frequent scrutiny. The transmission channel is not the fine itself. It is the way enforcement changes management time, product planning and engineering priorities.
That is why the obvious reaction is often too shallow. The first-order story is that the regulator may become tougher. The second-order story is that the cost of doing business shifts from occasional penalties to permanent compliance overhead. Once that happens, the effect on major platforms can be more durable than a single enforcement action, because the regulator shapes the operating model rather than just the balance sheet.
“Ian Cheshire joined the Ofcom Board on 9 June 2026. His appointment runs until 8 June 2030.”
The recent appointment matters because it frames the review as an early governance test rather than a late correction. This is a new chair examining whether the organisation’s structure fits the scale of the responsibilities it has acquired. That does not prove the institution is broken. But it does show that leadership now sees capacity as a policy variable, not merely an administrative detail.
The strongest reason to call this structural is that the remit is expanding by design. The January 2025 bulletin said the online safety regime was now in force and that sites and apps must act to better protect users, especially children. The March 2026 plan of work then showed Ofcom continuing to embed that regime while deepening its involvement in digital markets. A regulator that is simultaneously implementing one new framework and adding another is not confronting a temporary surge. It is operating at a permanently higher intensity.
The counter-argument is straightforward: every new regulatory regime is resource-heavy at first, then becomes routine. That is true, but only if the regulatory scope stabilises. Here it does not. Online safety, premium rate services, digital markets, search remedies and mobile oversight are piling onto the same institution. So even if the first year of a regime is the most demanding, the cumulative load keeps rising. This is not a one-off launch cost. It is a stacking problem.
The signal that would disprove the structural thesis is measurable: if Ofcom can absorb the new digital markets and online safety workload without slower enforcement timelines, without heavier reliance on external support, and without visible delays in consultations and decisions, then the capacity concern is overstated. If implementation speeds up while the brief widens, the review will look like internal optimisation rather than an admission of strain.
What The Review Means For Big Tech, Compliance And The Wider State
The immediate beneficiary of a serious review is the policy process itself. If Ofcom gets a clearer view of where it needs specialists, systems and funding, enforcement may become more consistent and less arbitrary. The exposed parties are the biggest platforms, because they sit closest to the point where regulation meets product design. With more capacity, Ofcom is likely to look more closely at safety systems, age checks, reporting workflows and market conduct across search and mobile-related services.
The practical effect is not limited to fines. In the short term, tighter oversight can raise compliance costs without moving user behaviour or market shares very much. Medium term, it can change product roadmaps as firms build regulatory constraints into launch planning. Long term, it can reshape competition by making scale more expensive to defend, especially if smaller rivals can adapt faster than the largest incumbents to new rules.
There is a risk in the other direction too. If Ofcom remains under-resourced while its remit keeps expanding, the UK could end up with a more ambitious rulebook and weaker execution. That would mean higher compliance costs for firms, slower redress for users and a regulator whose credibility is tested by the gap between mandate and capacity. In that scenario, the burden falls not just on Big Tech but on anyone trying to understand which obligations are actually enforceable.
The base case is that the review becomes a capacity reset rather than a crisis. Ofcom identifies where specialist hiring, technical systems or external support need to rise, the review leads to a more disciplined enforcement model, and the expanded powers become more credible. The upside case is that a better-resourced regulator can speed up digital markets and online safety decisions while reducing uncertainty for the market. The downside case is that the review exposes a larger gap between responsibility and resources, forcing ministers to choose between slowing the rollout of new duties or accepting uneven enforcement.
Three signals will matter most from here. First, whether Ofcom publishes a clearer operating plan tied to the new duties. Second, whether consultation and enforcement timelines improve or slip as the workload rises. Third, whether Ofcom and the CMA coordinate tightly enough on digital markets that firms face one coherent regime rather than two overlapping ones. If those indicators do not improve, the review will look less like housekeeping and more like a warning that one institution has been asked to do too much.
The broader conclusion is difficult to avoid: the issue is not one chair’s concern in isolation, but a regulator being asked to govern a more complex digital economy with an institutional toolkit designed for a simpler one. That is not a backlog that clears itself. It is a structural test of whether the UK can regulate Big Tech at the scale it now requires.
Ofcom’s challenge is not whether it can write tougher rules. It is whether it can still enforce them once the digital economy starts pushing back.
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