Good morning, Mobile World Congresspeople!
It’s day two of the expo. Speaking of which, remember 2G? That’s still the standard for 40% of the world’s mobile connections, according to the GSMA.
We’re looking at a high of 18°C (64°F) today and sunny skies. Try to take a moment away from all those glowing glass screens in the Fira and bask in the big glowing orb up in the sky once in a while.
What to watch for today
America First. Ajit Pai, the US Federal Communications Commission chairman, speaks on a panel with his counterparts from India, Mexico, Colombia, and Rwanda. Pai got a frosty response from the crowd last year when he was pushing the repeal of net neutrality protections. This year, he’s appearing at the invite-only side event for government ministers and CEOs, which is not streamed or generally open to the press. What might he say about Huawei behind closed doors?
The day in Huawei. Speaking of Huawei, yesterday lawmakers in the US were calling on the government to ban a wider range of gear made by the Chinese manufacturer over fears about national security. Today, deputy chairman Guo Ping speaks on a panel about—yep—5G something or other with a bunch of German car industry execs.
Maybe-this-isn’t-such-a-great-idea-after-all session of the day: “Debate: 5G Deployments in High-Frequency Bands are Uneconomic”
Gotta catch ’em all (onstage). A keynote featuring top execs from Citi, Groupon, and Niantic (maker of Pokémon Go) will consider the “connected experiences” for consumers that come to life when 5G becomes widespread. Hopefully, it’s something better than Trubbish, the 568th Pokémon, which is literally a pile of garbage.
Party planner. Several booths at the Fira hold mixers starting at 5pm, so if you stride up confidently and act like you belong you can probably get a glass of cava or two. Out of doors, the yachts in the port host glamorous receptions, but if you don’t have an invite you might not get onboard. The happy hour at 4YFN, from 6:30pm, attracts a younger, more raucous crowd, if you’re into that sort of thing. For an extensive rundown of other happenings around town, Startup Sesame has you covered.
What everyone is talking about
The edge isn’t just the guitarist from U2—it’s the latest buzzword floating around MWC. The “edge” is basically a term coined by enterprise folks to refer to computers and IoT devices—anything that isn’t the cloud. Examples could be the gizmo that runs digital signage or the sensor embedded in a machine that sends an alert when something goes wrong.
Pro tip: If you hear someone talking about the “intelligent edge,” they probably work at Microsoft. This is what Redmond dwellers call embedding AI into edge devices so they don’t have to talk to the cloud to do their job.
More highlights from yesterday
Fold, but don’t touch. Huawei’s Mate X and Samsung’s Galaxy Fold feature prominently at the companies’ booths, but neither allow visitors to touch the devices. Without a little hands-on time, how can you decide whether to drop north of $2,000 on these things? Shoutout to Chinese-American manufacturer Royole, though, whose FlexPai model is the only folding phone you can actually handle.
More phones? More phones! The barrage of new devices continues. Sony showed off its new line of Xperia smartphones, including the Xperia 1, an unusually long and narrow device designed for watching movies and playing games. Oppo, the Chinese company that’s big in India (and China), announced a prototype of its own folding phone. China’s ZTE unveiled a new 5G phone alongside its 5G network equipment, which the US isn’t too happy about either.
Sophia is here. The robot that’s making everyone overestimate the capabilities of AI, Sophia, got a job at this year’s MWC spouting facts about mobile connectivity and 5G. “Intelligent connectivity will help humans to manage the complexity of the modern world. For example, millions of connected sensors in cities can gather data for AIs working to solve the big problems, so that means less pollution and less time spent in traffic jams,” Sophia said, most likely just reading off a prewritten script.
Chart interlude
5G is far from the next big thing, if Google searches are anything to go by.
Mike likes…
The Selfieccino. Security software company Eset was offering lattes with printed pictures of your photo in foam on top. It’s not entirely clear what the connection was with web security, but at least it provided a precious memory of Dave and Mike’s friendship. Until Mike drank it.
… and Dave digs
Microsoft’s new HoloLens 2 is an update of the mixed-reality headset with a greater field of view, better ergonomics, and more processing power. The larger field of view makes the experience drastically better from the moment you first put on the headset. It also feels more stable, mainly due to the weight being distributed away from the front of the device.
The digital objects you see when wearing it are somewhat translucent, and still not high-enough resolution to seem tactile. Most impressive, though, is the HoloLens 2’s eye-tracking capabilities. After calibrating, the sensors could accurately pick out small objects you’re looking at about six feet away, and naturally scroll through text as you read.
Daily challenge
Your task today is to drop “massive MIMO active antenna” into casual conversation. (If you can’t do it here, where can you do it?) Tell us how it goes, and we may showcase your creativity in a future email.
Seen and heard
Welcome to Barcelona! Posters dotted the walls near the entrance to the Fira accusing the world’s largest tech companies of exploiting workers and ruining the environment.
“…and on the other side you have China and the rest of the world.”—European telco CEO describes the balance of opinion in debates within industry associations about the US blacklisting of Huawei.
I see what you did there: Forkbeard is a Norwegian startup that says its indoor positioning technology is 100 times more accurate than Bluetooth. In the late 900s, Sweyn Forkbeard overthrew his father Harald, who was also known as Bluetooth, as king of Norway.
“We know from every survey we do that customers are willing to pay way more for their mobile service, because they would rather lose their wallet than their phone.”—Ferry Grijpink, senior partner at McKinsey.
News from around the world
Britain’s Labour Party backed calls for a new Brexit referendum. Opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn bowed to pressure from his party to give the public another vote on the exit from the European Union if lawmakers vote down prime minister Theresa May’s next attempt to secure parliamentary approval. May is due to update the House of Commons on Tuesday after returning from a meeting of EU leaders.
Iran’s foreign minister resigned in an Instagram post. Mohammad Javad Zarif, architect of the nuclear deal with world powers from which the US withdrew last year, unexpectedly announced he was leaving his job but didn’t explain why. If his resignation is accepted by president Hassan Rouhani, the cleric will lose a key ally and face a harder task in negotiating with the West.
An Australian cardinal was found guilty of child sexual abuse. Vatican treasurer George Pell was convicted of molesting two choir boys in the 1990s. He is the highest-ranking Roman Catholic leader ever found guilty of sexual abuse. The sealed verdict by an Australian court in December was made public today, on the heels of a Vatican conference (paywall) on clerical sexual abuse. He’ll be sentenced tomorrow.
The SEC asked a judge to hold Elon Musk in contempt over a tweet. The US Securities and Exchange Commission said that the Tesla CEO’s tweet last week about his company’s projected production this year was inaccurate and violated a settlement deal reached last year. Musk is supposed to get public statements material to investors vetted by company officials in advance.
Matters of debate
Chinese footbinding was about work, not sex. The archaic practice became a way to control women’s sedentary labor.
Closing the mobile phone gender gap is a huge opportunity. An uptick in smartphone use among women in low and middle-income countries could be a $700 billion opportunity.
Big Pharma should be treated more like Big Tobacco. The industry is overdue for an investigation on price fixing, overzealous patents, and sketchy financial practices.
Surprising discoveries
China is using facial recognition on pigs. Local tech firms are trying to help the nation keep track of livestock (paywall) to prevent a swine-flu epidemic.
Vietnam deported a Kim Jong Un impersonator. The Australian comedian named Howard X was in Hanoi ahead of the Trump-Kim summit.
Earth’s atmosphere is bigger than we thought. According to NASA and ESA data, our planet’s gaseous layer actually extends far past the Moon.
Our best wishes for an inspiring day at the expo. Please send any news, tips, 5G Pokémon, and printable macchiatos to us, Dave, Mike, and Jason. The best way to keep up with news while you’re on the go is the Quartz app.