Alt de glemte å si

The Mobile World Congress (MWC) once again set new records with over 108.000 visitors coming to Barcelona to exchange knowledge, experience, visions, and of course, thousands of business cards. MWC is one of the world’s most successful trade shows, and 2017 marks a decade since GSMA has become less financially independent of its members whose interests it defends.

A lot has happened since the 2005 MWC in Cannes attracted 34,000 to the event it has become today. http://www.strandconsult.dk/sw1332.asp The GSM World Congress started as a conference for mobile operators and those selling technology and solutions to mobile operators. In practice, the MWC has shifted focus to what other players can do with mobile technologies, and less on the mobile operators themselves. Moreover, MWC has evolved from being a conference focusing on GSMA's members' needs and the services they deliver over a mobile network to a conference focusing on mobile solutions. In practice, GSMA has chosen not to focus on how operators must finance their investments if they are to realize the dream of 5G.

This year’s MWC was an impressive event, but it was clinically cleansed of all the bad news and challenges facing mobile operators around the world. I spoke with several politicians at the conference, and they did not understand why increasing regulation is a problem for mobile operators. One of the most important politicians in the EU told me that it looks like 5G will drive tremendous growth in mobile companies' revenue, and he could not understand the complaints from mobile operators around Europe. He simply assumes that mobile operators will automatically make money with a new mobile standard, even though that was not the case when they rolled out 3G and 4G.