Robert Pointon began a degree at Massey University in 1991. Then in 1993 he completed a BSc majoring in Computer Science and Electronics. In 1994 he completed an Honours degree in Computer Science. From the beginning of 1995 he conducted research with the PAL group in the area of concurrent lazy functional programming. In 1998 he became a Massey staff member as a Graduate Assistant.

In 1999 he came to work at Heriot-Watt as a Research Associate. Finally in 2001 he became a Courseware Developer for online teaching materials.

In 2002 he became a Learning Technology Engineer (Software Developer) in the Learning Technology Centre which later formed into the Interactive University.

In 2005 he returned to Heriot-Watt as a Research Associate working on the Hume EmBounded project.