In many ways, Mobile World Congress (MWC) is the perfect way for Huawei to highlight its business and vast offerings. The whole event is a siloed extravaganza of diverse technologies with far too much on display to understand or fully hold in your head all at once.

It all comes together, however, if you build it out piece by piece. Traditional telecommunications services are the foundation – 5G is the advancer. From there you can spread out to the Internet of Things (IoT) and automation. On top of that, you have innovative cloud services and then, of course, AI – which has taken up a larger platform at MWC 2025.

AI is a feature of much of Huawei’s MWC showcases, deeply embedded in its telco solutions, powering its B2B IoT networks and also enabling more personalized experiences across its consumer and office hardware.

This division overseeing this, known as the Consumer Business Group or CGB to Huawei, is closely aligned with its global reputation. The success of its smartphones took Huawei to a new audience in 2018 and 2019. But it is also known as the segment that felt the US sanctions hardest: in 2021, the company recorded a 28.5% year-on-year decline in revenue. The next year saw a 69% year-on-year decrease in net profit. Without access to US software and silicon, Huawei phones lost their appeal in the West – almost dropping out of big markets, like the UK, overnight.

While that will have hurt, and no doubt caused some job losses, it didn’t land a killer blow. What’s more, it also hasn’t curtailed Huawei’s expanse in Europe. The company has returned to profitability, rather rapidly, with very impressive revenues for 2023 and 2024 – this includes the smartphone business, which is now very healthy. At a company event last year, Meng Wangzhou, Huawei’s chief financial officer, announced that it was no longer in “crisis mode”.

This has led some to suggest that the company is back from the dead, a hyperbolic sentiment that seems to tie too much of Huawei’s overall business fortunes with its consumer goods. While there was a significant hit from the sanctions on its revenues – and there still appears to be trouble here – Huawei sales remained strong domestically and in regions like the Middle East and parts of Europe.

For example, Huawei’s first foldable smartphone was launched before both the pandemic and the sanctions. But just before MWC the firm released a new three-way foldable device, where the screen is made up of three panels that fold up like a glass accordion. For a division that almost ‘killed’ its parent, the continued development is impressive, a testament to the company’s R&D.

Throughout MWC, each Huawei executive talked about the company’s approach to research and development and how it had enabled their division to flourish. From its new cloud storage products to its AI-enabled business tools, the firm is driving innovations across the board. However, it appears that this is also a siloed part of the Chinese giant, with teams split into short-term research and development (which is where its new products and services largely come from) and then long-term R&D – heavy theoretical and mathematical research (moonshot-R&D, if you will) conducted across the world in Huawei labs and various universities. According to its communication team, more than 50% of Huawei’s considerable workforce is in some form of research and development.

Huawei weathers growing trade wars

The sanctions came under the first administration of President Trump, with the White House claiming Huawei was a security risk. To date, there is no hard evidence for this. However, from there the UK imposed its own Huawei ban. This largely extended to removing Huawei hardware from UK telecoms infrastructure, but the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) also pointed to US sanctions – essentially claiming Huawei was less secure because it wouldn’t have US technologies and would need to rely on Chinese hardware.

In 2025, the second Trump administration’s sharp trade tariffs have rattled America’s allies and raised uncertainty across international markets. There is a sense that it’s also forcing the rest of the world to either look for new trade relations or rekindle unions that are broken.

US companies might start to feel the pinch in their financials as Trump 2.0 takes full effect. Trade sanctions hurt American companies too; Intel isn’t doing particularly well right now, having ended 2024 with a large cull (15% of its workforce) and the resignation of its CEO Pat Gelsinger. Both of those blows are intrinsically tied to its sluggish revenues and new restrictions that stop it from supplying chips to Huawei will add more difficulty.

For all the governments scrambling to respond to tariffs, and the companies concerned about their supply chains, a lesson can be found in Huawei’s approach to the initial US sanctions. There is a clear method of global business without US dollars, and it’s a fascinatingly simple strategy: diversification. Whether it be new business lines based on sound R&D or launching products and services in emerging markets and untapped regions (the Middle East, Africa, Poland) – Huawei is an example we might all need in these chaotic times.

Humanoid robots and people will be able to work truly side-by-side this year, according to the CEO of one leading robotics company.

In a discussion at Mobile World Congress (MWC), Peggy Johnson — who stepped in as CEO of Agility Robotics last year — shared what the company's Digit robot was capable of doing now, and what was expected to be achieved in the near future.

Johnson painted a picture of humans and machines working alongside each other without the need to segregate the machines for safety reasons.

The 1.7m-tall, 85kg-heavy Digit robots can currently lift 16kg in weight, with hopes that will increase to 25kg soon, she said. At the moment, that allows them to take on simple tasks in warehousing and logistics, such as collecting an object and moving it into a tray for another robot to take away.

The advent of generative AI allowed companies like Agility to take robotics that previously required heavy programming to be controlled via simple voice commands.

"We're able to overlay AI onto our traditionally controlled robot, and really supercharge its power," she said.

Human in the loop

But, humanoid robots remain limited. Johnson noted that demos of robots doing backflips or making coffee may catch attention, but that requires intense programming.

With automation alone, the reality of what's possible is much more basic — but still useful. She remarked that warehouses can be heavily automated, but still require a human to pick up parts or products and move them to where they're needed.

"We focused on what is actually possible today, and that is simple tasks, [such as] moving materials," she said, adding: "It's able to do work that's repetitive, can be somewhat dull, tasks that generally people don't like — and in fact there's about a million jobs in this space that are open in the US alone, they can't find people to fill these jobs."

Digit is already used in a warehouse facility in Atlanta, Johnson noted. However, she said that robotics can't take on all aspects of a human worker's role.

"It doesn't complain, doesn't fight with its coworkers," she laughed. "It just does the job.”

"It's augmenting somebody, who that was part of their job — for a few hours a day, they've got to move this product, and then they're over here doing something else," she said. Adding it "augments the human in the loop."

Imperfect AI

Notably, Johnson admitted that limitations in AI mean robots still need human colleagues to keep them on track. Johnson demonstrated a Digit robot on stage, telling it verbally via an iPad to pick up an item — a yellow sponge — and place it into a bin.

Slowly, the robot considered the command, before meticulously moving the item.

Even such a simple display could go wrong, she admitted: "It's why you don't want AI to completely control a robot right now."

However, such tasks were previously onerous to achieve, as they required detailed programming — and it's easier to just pick up the sponge yourself at that point. AI controls help avoid that burden, though building a workflow still takes time.

"You can give a command to a machine and it can act upon it," she said. "That's going to change everything."

The demonstration was powered by Google's Gemini 2 model, though Johnson said Agility supported the use of all AI models in its robotics.

"All the models operate slightly differently, and they're all right now building their robotics foundation models, which is why we became agnostic," she explained.

"We just wanted to swap in whichever one is working best for whatever use case."

Safety first

That said, there's much work that needs to be done, Johnson said, before these robots are capable of everything Agility's customers would like them to do.

Indeed, she said customers have said they'd like to be able to send a Digit down to the loading dock to pick up a box and bring it back to a workstation.

Beyond technology challenges, that would mean Digit has to move alongside humans. Right now, robotics must stay inside what's known as a "work cell", a defined space that humans don't enter for their own safety.

"Right now there are no humanoid robots who are certified to operate outside of a protected area," Johnson said, pinning the blame on the technology itself as well as regulators. "The big unlock [of potential for humanoid robots] is coming out of the work cell and being what's called 'cooperatively safe' around humans."

That would mean a Digit would be able to safely walk down to the loading bay, staying a safe distance from humans even if they did something unexpected.

Johnson said Agility would demonstrate robots operating outside of a work cell later this year. She said: "Agility has solved for that. It's a very challenging product problem."

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AI can help operators accelerate broadband deployments, in particular if it's used to design networks, according to new research.

A report by the World Broadband Association (WBBA) argued that the technology could help in the pre-deployment phases of broadband networks by being put to work during network planning and expansion.

The findings of the report were presented at the Broadband Development Congress (BDC) in Barcelona this week.

So far, telecom companies are focused on AI for customer service and network troubleshooting and optimization — all useful applications but by bringing AI into systems earlier, there could be further benefits.

By using AI to help with network development, operators can make sure they roll out infrastructure to the right places at the right time and with the right technologies, the report noted. Similarly, this could help ensure a return on investment (ROI).

"The pre-deployment phases in broadband are periods of decision-making and network planning before infrastructure is rolled out or upgraded," said Martin Creaner, Director General of the WBBA.

"It’s an ideal environment for AI to make an impact, and if its models are supported by the right data and algorithms, then it can be used to help operators predict the return on their investments much more accurately."

Using AI to support broadband deployments

The white paper suggested, for example, that an AI model can identify the most suitable areas for a new broadband deployment, when to make upgrades from copper to fiber, or how to improve penetration in rural areas by considering existing networks, customer data, and geography, as well as costs.

"All of these decisions should be informed by many interdependent factors and moving pieces related to deployment costs, demand dynamics, wholesale versus retail trade-offs, and regulatory constraints," the report noted.

"AI can play a key role in generating and analyzing a huge quantity of high-quality data for some (or all) of these factors to produce outputs for one (or more) of these decisions while optimizing the ultimate objective variable (which, in this case, is assumed to be ROI in broadband investment)."

That information can help operators decide when and where to deploy, which customers to target, and how to price services, the white paper noted.

However, the WBBA warned that this approach requires the right dataset and that AI has limitations. As such, operators should understand that it works best with clear constraints and is used alongside existing analysis for the best results.

"AI is not a magic wand that can solve the entire ROI optimization problem, but it can add significant accuracy to parts of the equation," the paper noted.

AI needs broadband too

The WBBA also noted that more efficient broadband was necessary to power the shift to AI and next-generation internet services.

"There is no single use case that will drive demand for gigabit broadband access," the WBBA said in a separate report about Gigabit broadband.

"It will be driven by a combination of three core trends: a rapid increase in connected devices, the development of advanced video-enabled AI applications, and the shift of computing power to the cloud. This combination will drive the need for high-speed, low-latency, highly reliable, and consistent networks."

As part of its Gigacity Index 2025, the WBBA ranked the broadband sophistication of cities around the world, revealing Singapore, Shanghai, Zurich, Hong Kong, and Dubai as the leaders.

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The mobile industry is predicted to be worth $11 trillion in the next five years, with six-in-ten people globally now connected via mobile services — and closing that usage gap could boost economies by an additional $3.5 trillion.

That's according to a report launched at Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2025, held in Barcelona this week.

According to the Mobile Economy Report 2025, mobile technologies and services generated 5.8% of global GDP last year, worth $6.5 trillion in economic value — and by 2030, that's predicted to rise to 8.4% of GDP and be worth nearly $11 trillion to global economies.

"Our industry connects nearly six billion people, and powers economies worldwide," said Mats Granryd, Director General of the GSMA, the organization that runs MWC. "And, at MWC, over 50% of attendees come from outside the mobile ecosystem, a clear signal that industries recognize the vast opportunities our networks create."

The report found that 4.7 billion people, or 58% of the world's population, were using mobile internet by the end of 2024. That's expected to continue climbing to 5.5 billion users, or nearly two-thirds of the world, by 2030.

However, the report noted that adoption is starting to slow, with 110 million people using mobile internet for the first time last year, down from more than 200m in previous years, with Sub-Saharan Africa, and the Middle East and North Africa posting the lowest take-up rates of 29% and 50% respectively.

"Of the 3.4 billion people who remain unconnected to mobile internet, almost 90% live in an area already covered by mobile broadband but do not use mobile internet," the report noted.

"With mobile internet adoption outpacing network expansion, this usage gap has continued to shrink, standing at 38% by the end of 2024."

Of the existing mobile connections, two billion are on 5G, with 5G expected to completely overtake 4G by 2028 and make up 57% of total mobile connections by 2030.

Closing the mobile usage gap

To close that usage gap and tap into $11 trillion in economic value, Granryd said in his opening keynote that the industry must complete its transition to 5G Standalone — a network design that works without 4G, offering better resiliency, efficiency and speeds.

According to a separate GSMA report, 5G Standalone will drive 70% of enterprise revenue expansion in the next five years, worth as much as $127 billion in value.

Similarly, figures from the Mobile Economy 2025 report show 60 operators are already offering commercial 5G services on Standalone networks, led by Asia and Europe.

Beyond 5G Standalone, Granryd called for the industry to consider new revenue models to harness the potential of AI and Open Gateway APIs, which is a framework for giving developers access to operator networks to create new services and applications as well as tackling fraud.

As of last month, the report noted, the GSMA Open Gateway project had signed up 72 operator groups that make up nearly eight in ten mobile connections globally.

Granryd also called on operators to keep up with AI, with the report noting that early deployments of AI in mobile technologies have focused on internal solutions to improve network performance and customer services.

This has primarily focused on areas such as energy optimization and in call centers, but AI could power customer-facing solutions and open up new revenue opportunities, in particular in enterprises.

"This week will shine a light on those opportunities – from 5G to AI and many more – and their role in helping us unlock new markets, drive innovation, and shape the future of the global digital economy,” he added.

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Huawei’s cloud division has seen significant growth outside of China over the last few years, with a sizable uptake in Europe.

The company said its cloud business had expanded by 50% outside mainland China, with 140 carriers and 500 financial institutions adopting its digital services. Within Europe, the company said it now had more than 33,000 customers, many of which have been amassed over the last two years.

Speaking after its Cloud Summit in Barcelona, ahead of MWC 2025, Jacqueline Shi, president of Huawei Cloud’s global marketing and sales service, told ITPro that part of its success outside of China can be attributed to its customer-focused approach to services.

“Cloud is a global business and the hyperscalers have their own advantages,” Shi said. “Huawei Cloud practices ‘everything as a service’, which means we care a lot about our customer’s needs. We listen to them and customize our solutions to them.”

The company’s success was also noted by Gartner at the tail end of 2024, as it was named a ‘Challenger’ in the research institute’s Magic Quadrant for Cloud Database Management Systems.

Part of the report’s results are based on the ability of vendors to execute a ‘completeness of vision’ – which essentially means the product has both good availability in specific regions, but also that it serves those regions with what they need. Which also highlights Huawei’s customer-centric approach.

Huawei’s cloud databases have been widely deployed across 33 regions, with flagship products including its AI native database management platform GaussDB, and its data warehouse service, GaussDB(DWS).

Huawei Cloud's push from ‘cloud native’ to AI native’

During its Cloud Summit, Shi spoke at length about Huawei Cloud’s AI strategy and how the Chinese company aims to transition from cloud native to AI native. Shi defines ‘AI native’ in two ways; one is "AI for Cloud", which means it reshapes and upgrades all of the company’s services into intelligent ones using AI.

The other is "Cloud for AI", which is the aim of building the best platform, with compute architecture, data, modeling tools, and professional services, to accelerate the development of AI.

Huawei Cloud is now working towards the construction of AI native infrastructure, such as a CloudMatrix and AI Cloud Service. Here it will develop AI native cloud services for databases, knowledge lakes, and software development pipelines.

It will also offer AI models and tools for customers and partners so that they can train and run their AI models.

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Laptop running low on charge? Forget lugging a cable around or searching for power points — simply find a sunny spot.

That's the idea of Lenovo's Yoga Solar PC, which features solar panels on the rear of the laptop to convert sunshine into power, with the firm claiming that just 20 minutes in the sun is enough to power an hour of video playback.

However, though the design was shown off at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, the laptop remains a proof of concept.

Alongside that glimpse at a smarter future for mobile working, Lenovo also unveiled new laptop designs that are focused on AI: a pair of Lenovo Yoga Pro Aura Editions and a "future-proofed" Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 3x.

The new laptops highlight the PC industry's shift to "AI powered" devices, with the Aura line focused on bringing AI to the Lenovo lineup via a partnership with Intel, which has struggled amid the rise in AI.

"As we push the limits of AI innovation higher than ever, it is important to remember that delivering access to AI for all is equally a core tenet of Lenovo’s philosophy," said Jun Ouyang, Lenovo’s SVP and GM of the consumer segment, intelligent devices group.

"Likewise, as we endeavor to redefine the boundaries of power in technology, we must ensure that it continues to be a positive force."

How does the Yoga Solar PC concept laptop work?

The solar-powered laptop is a simple idea: make use of the rear of the device to house solar panels to give the battery a boost. Lenovo said the setup featured a conversion rate above 24%, claiming it as one of the highest in the industry.

The proof of concept Yoga Solar PC features what Lenovo calls "back contact cell" technology, a design that puts the mounting brackets and electrical contacts on the rear of the cell, giving more space on the front for solar absorption — and letting it look a bit cleaner.

Despite the addition of the solar panels, the design remains a slim 15mm and weighs just 1.22kg.

The system automatically adapts to different light savings, adjusting the charging to send any harvested energy to the system. It works in low light as well as bright sun, letting the laptop slowly recharge at all times.

In direct sunlight, Lenovo said twenty minutes is enough for the solar panels to absorb and convert the energy required to playback an hour of video.

Lenovo hasn’t indicated if it plans to develop the proof of concept into a fully-fledged consumer product, but did unveil an additional proof of concept with solar ideas: a USB-C power bank with detachable solar panel that can be moved into the best position to capture the sun.

Proof of concept AI projects

Alongside the solar experiments, Lenovo showed off a few other proof-of-concept ideas focused on AI.

That includes an AI Display with its own NPU, which the "display NPU" (dNPU) uses to adapt to the user's movements to adjust the screen for best viewing angles, as well as giving AI powers to non-AI PCs.

"The dNPU not only enhances the monitor’s abilities, but also empowers non-AI PCs with AI computing power," Lenovo explained.

"With the AI Display with NPU inside, non-AI PCs will be able to use Large Language Models, receiving commands from the user, analyzing and recognizing the intent, and allowing the Assistant to execute the request."

Other ideas touted by the firm at MWC include the Lenovo AI Stick, which can be plugged into a PC without its own NPU to power AI such as large language models or graphics apps. The stick features its own 32 TOPS NPU and connects via USB-C Thunderbolt port.

New Yoga Aura laptops

Lenovo extended its AI-focused Aura lineup with a pair of convertible Yoga Pros, the 16in Lenovo Yoga Pro 9i Aura Edition and the 14in Yoga Pro 7i Aura Edition, adding to previously announced laptops.

The Aura brand focuses on adding AI features like smart modes to enhance PC customization, smart sharing tools to link Android and iOS, and a smart care tech support tool, all powered by an AI chip from Intel.

The 16in Lenovo Yoga Pro 9i Aura Edition is being marketed at creative professionals, with a tandem, or double layer, OLED display that's brighter without draining power. It's powered by an Intel Core Ultra processor and can be configured to include an Nvidia RTX 5070 GPU.

Meanwhile, the 14in Yoga Pro 7i Aura Edition features a 14.5in 3K OLED display, while all Yoga keyboards have oil and water-resistant coatings for better typing. For those looking for a 14in laptop powered by an AMD chip, Lenovo also showed off the Yoga Pro 7, which runs an AMD Ryzen AI 300 Series processor.

The 16in Lenovo Yoga Pro 9i Aura Edition will be available in EMEA in June with a starting price of €1,699 inc VAT and the 14in Yoga Pro 7i Aura Edition arrives this month with a starting price of €1,399 inc VAT.

Ideapad Slim 3X

Alongside the new Aura laptops powered by Intel chips, Lenovo also revealed at MWC the 15in IdeaPad Slim 3X ($649/€599), a more budget option that Lenovo said delivered "AI for anybody".

This features a Qualcomm Snapdragon X processor with a 45 TOPS NPU, giving users a balance of battery life and performance while also supporting Copilot+, Microsoft's AI suite.

Lenovo added "future proof storage expandability" to the Ideapad Slim 3Xby including a spare SSD slot for more storage if needed.

It also features support for Wi-Fi 7, allowing for fast charging with two-hours battery life after just 15 minutes plugged in. The Ideapad Slim 3X is available in EMEA from March.

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I always feel that the ‘C’ in Mobile World Congress (MWC) should be ‘Conga’. You get a real sense of chaos and excitement as various PR people lead you through a dizzying flurry of tech announcements, briefings, and keynote speeches.

You have enough time to take in about 10% of what’s happening across the Fira Grand Via’s eight Halls. The bigger companies take over halls one to three, which leaves every startup imaginable fighting for spaces across halls four, five, six, and seven. If you manage to wade through all that and reach hall eight, all you win is the view of a concrete wall.

Mobile connectivity is the main deal with MWC and every time I have attended, the conference feels like we’re checking up on the progress of 5G. Since 2018, when it was the next big thing, it has dominated the show. If you remember 2019, it was fitted into smartphones, governments were talking up rollout plans, and things like the Internet of Things (IoT) were on the cusp of being revolutionized by it. However, I recall MWC 2023 being about fully realizing 5G – like we had all forgotten what it was meant to do. It was all 5.5G and the Metaverse (remember that?). I’m starting to doubt 5G will be fully realized before 6G arrives.

Part of the issue is that we had that big MWC break in 2020; we had more important things to worry about (let's not go into it again). That could arguably account for the stuttering rollout of 5G. There was a virtual return of the conference in 2021 which wasn’t quite the same, but since 2022, MWC has come back stronger; over 100,000 people attended in 2024.

And what about 5G? Well, it’s still one of the main themes of the show. ‘5G inside’ is about the next phase of its rollout; what will drive its evolution and how it can become a more ‘versatile, reliable, and ubiquitous’ network, according to the MWC website. Which is odd as that was what everyone thought 5G was going to be from the get-go.

“The question for telcos remains how to monetize 5G and leverage AI to enable other verticals to modernize, from Industry 4.0 to AI-powered cybersecurity via drone-as-a service options,” Forrester VP principal analyst, Thomas Husson, explains to ITPro.

The nod to generative AI is understandable as it will have its place at the conference, as it does now with all events. Under the theme of ‘AI+’, speakers and sessions will focus on the practical deployments and impact of generative AI. The aim is to understand how it will create new levels of ‘natural interaction’ between people and computers – essentially, how it will develop more personalized experiences.

Husson also suggests that telecom operators will begin to use their distribution channels to strike deals with various AI players, such as DeepSeek, OpenAI, and Google.

There is a skeptic in me who balks at the idea of generative AI being shoehorned into MWC. You can argue that it’s there purely because it’s the buzzy trend of the moment, but where AI is now has a lot to do with 5G. The speed and bandwidth of 5G networks have provided the infrastructure needed for AI systems to process and analyze vast amounts of data – where would generative AI be if not for the capability to compute at such volume?

And what of the new geopolitical landscape? MWC has seen its fair share of protests and there’s no shortage of talking points in 2025. The impact of generative AI on the workforce, the global skills shortage, groundbreaking elections, tariff wars, and, of course, the return of President Trump. One way or another they all have an impact on business and technology, and it feels unlikely that it won’t be mentioned in some way at MWC.

As ITPro’s reviews editor, I will be hoping to see some new office hardware – laptops, monitors, tablets, PCs – though I’m not expecting much in this regard. There aren’t many hardware launches at the event these days, as vendors mostly make announcements on their own terms and most of what’s new has already been seen at CES. I will be there from day one, so please do reach out to me – bobby.hellard@futurenet.com – and share your experiences with ITPro.

T-Mobile was able to protect sensitive customer information and prevent disruption to its services after detecting malicious attempts to infiltrate its systems, according to its security chief.

Jeff Simon, chief security officer at T-Mobile, published an update on a string of recent cyber attacks targeting wireless companies, believed to be orchestrated by the Salt Typhoon group.

The update states that the attacks originated from the network one of T-Mobile’s wireline providers it was connected to, but Simon said connectivity to the provider’s network, which may still be compromised, was quickly severed.

Simon noted that unlike other providers, and despite media reporting, T-Mobile’s customer information was not impacted.

“Many reports claim these bad actors have gained access to some providers’ customer information over an extended period of time – phone calls, text messages, and other sensitive information, particularly from government officials. This is not the case at T-Mobile,” he wrote.

“Our defenses protected our sensitive customer information, prevented any disruption of our services, and stopped the attack from advancing. Bad actors had no access to sensitive customer data (including calls, voicemails or texts).”

Speaking to Bloomberg, Simon said T-Mobile’s network engineers discovered the attack after noticing suspicious behavior on some of the company’s network devices.

The behavior wasn’t “inherently malicious” but may have been used to gain a clearer understanding of the company's corporate network, with threat actors probing for potential lateral movement opportunities.

Simon stated that T-Mobile’s layered network design, featuring network segmentation and robust monitoring, partnerships with third-party cyber experts, and its swift response all helped to prevent the attackers from causing further damage.

Salt Typhoon is on a rampage

Although T-Mobile were unable to “definitively identify” the attacker’s identity, the behavior is consistent with previous attacks leveraged by the Salt Typhoon group.

Trend Micro published a report on 25 November detailing previous activity of Salt Typhoon, also known as Earth Estries, Ghost Emperor, or UNC2286).

The report stated the group has primarily targeted critical sectors such as telecommunications and government entities across the US, Asia, Middle East, and South Africa since 2023 and potentially even earlier.

“The group employs advanced attack techniques and multiple backdoors, such as GHOSTSPIDER, SNAPPYBEE, and MASOL RAT, affecting several Southeast Asian telecommunications companies and government entities,” Trend Micro outlined.

“Earth Estries exploits public-facing server vulnerabilities to establish initial access and uses living-off-the-land binaries for lateral movement within networks to deploy malware and conduct long-term espionage.”

According to the report, the group has compromised over 20 organizations in the telecommunications, technology, consulting, chemical, and transportation industries, as well as government agencies.

Reports of Salt Typhoon infiltrating internet service providers (ISPs) in the US came out in September 2024, with the Wall Street Journal confirming in October that major players Verizon Communications, AT&T, and Lumen Technologies were among a list of companies whose networks were breached.

Unnamed sources familiar with the matter told theWSJ that the access may have allowed the group to access information from systems the federal government uses for court-authorized wiretapping, describing the compromise as "potentially catastrophic”.

T-Mobile appears to have avoided the worst impacts of Salt Typhoon’s campaign, according to Simon, who added that he had recently attended a meeting of leaders at the White House to discuss how the industry can work together to mitigate the threats the group pose and avoid further damage.

Huawei has claimed its new Cyber Engine database security system is "the best in the world" with a 99.9% detection rate for ransomware.

The system, which was launched on the opening day of the 2023 Mobile World Congress event in Barcelona, is described as a "last line of defence" by the Chinese conglomerate.

"The mechanism we have built for Cyber Engine, together with data storage, is the last line of defence, but it also should be the most effective way," Huawei's president of IT product line, Dr Peter Zhou, told journalists after his presentation.

"Our mechanism and also the algorithm we have developed within Cyber Engine is AI-trained to detect the fingerprint of the ransomware virus and whether or not there has been an attack on the system," he explained.

Once it has detected an attack, the system then informs the database to begin shutting down affected systems or systems that can be implicated. It does this with a technique called 'air gap' which is about isolating data sets.

"We honestly believe its ability to detect ransomware is the best in the world," Zhuo said.

Ransomware detection systems, whether AI-powered or otherwise, will tend to have a very high success rate, according to Jake Moore, cyber security expert at ESET, however, they have to work every time to remain secure.

"An intruder only has to infect once for the disruption to begin," he told IT Pro. "SMBs must always prepare for the worst-case scenario by simulating an attack to fully understand the localised risks rather than relying on any one tool.

"Threat detection and response are absolutely vital but cannot be relied upon completely. However small the percentage 'get out clause' is, it remains every information security controller's nightmare and therefore preparation is key to survival."

What's behind Huawei's growth in cloud computing?

Cyber Engine was just one of several new cloud computing capabilities Huawei revealed at MWC.

The Chinese firm also launched Blu-ray storage. Related to the storage of cold data, which requires low-cost archiving, Huawei said it has a longer service life and reduces the total cost of ownership for organisations.

The company also unveiled a multi-cloud storage service that deals with cross-cloud data transfers. This service is simply called 'Tiering' and categorises data to create a prioritised order for transfers to and from other cloud environments. Its aim is to reduce energy consumption as well as lower operational costs.

Another multi-cloud-based offering was the Cloud on Cloud solution, which will enable carriers to quickly build and operate their own cloud services with the capabilities and resources of Huawei.

One of the driving factors behind some of its cloud ventures, particularly its expansive database portfolio, is an expectation of increased data generation.

Dr Zhou spoke of yottabytes of data being created by 2030 - a storage volume equivalent to a quadrillion gigabytes. The company is keen to begin working on systems that handle vast amounts of data, with its AI-based security system acting as a first step.

This automatically-generated transcript is taken from the IT Pro Podcast episode ‘The best bits of MWC 2022'. To listen to the full episode, click here. We apologise for any errors.

Adam Shepherd

Hi, I'm Adam Shepherd, and you're listening to the IT Pro Podcast where this week we're talking about the most interesting highlights from MWC 2022. Every Spring, Barcelona plays host to Mobile World Congress, one of the biggest events in the mobile technology calendar. It brings together mobile hardware providers, networking infrastructure vendors, and a whole host of other organisations to showcase the latest developments in the industry. The show features everything from the unveiling of new laptops and smartphones, to the newest advancements in 5G, IoT and telecommunications standards, and welcomes around 100,000 visitors on average. Rather than having to pace the halls of the Fira Barcelona yourself, however, I'm joined this week by Bobby Hellard and Sabina Weston, who were on the ground bringing us all of the biggest updates from the event.

Bobby Hellard

Hello.

Sabina Weston

Hi!

Adam

So guys, what did you think of MWC 2022?

Sabina

Yeah, it was, it was amazing, really. This was my first MWC. In fact, it was my first international tech conference. I hadn't been outside of London previously, when it comes to tech events. So So I'm extremely lucky to have this as my first international tech event. And that I got to travel all the way to sunny Barcelona for it. We're about you, Bobby was was your first conference? I don't think so. Right?

Bobby

Nice. No, this is my second MWC. I did go to the last major one in 2019. And there was, I wouldn't say like a drastic difference between the two. But it's a slightly lesser scale now. But it's fun, it's good. Lots of exciting products. Lots of trouble too, with the BA problems at the start, you know, affected a lot of people getting there. But I think it was generally, it was well received, the whole show went without any other hitches.

Adam

So Bobby, how much has it changed as a result of COVID?

Bobby

Well, size wise, it's nowhere near as big as what it was in 2019. I'm not sure on the attendance figures, but there was a lot less than what it was before the pandemic. And we just had more virtual presentations. So companies like Realme and Lenovo, they chose to give us video showcases but they didn't actually attend. So that's completely different from 2019. Lenovo had one of the biggest stands in 2019. But they had no presence this year. And that is probably due to the restrictions in China where you have longer quarantine periods. So it probably didn't make sense for them to come. But they were kind of missed.

Sabina

No, yeah, this is this is the same thing that I heard, that a lot of companies have to restrict sort of like the number of representatives, basically due to due to ongoing travel restrictions. So teams were, if not smaller, they were more European based, like he said, and I honestly was surprised to hear that. I mean, I was already pretty overwhelmed by like the scale of the event. And then when I was told that actually, this is only like, half of what it used to be, or, you know, 70 percent, maybe of what it used to be I was I was shocked. I I wouldn't know how to act, I think, at that big of a tech event.

Adam

Yeah, the last time I was there was several years ago now. And it was an overwhelming experience, I think. I mean, for those who haven't been to the Fira Barcelona, which is the venue that MWC is held in, its enormous; it's really, really big. And just getting around it with the amount of people that are usually in attendance is a job in and of itself. And yeah, kind of it's it's one of those events where you spend half your time just trying to get from one section of it to another, you know, fighting through crowds of strolling business people who are clearly in no particular hurry to get anywhere.

Bobby

Have you ever had to go all the way to hall eight?

Adam

I have, many times.

Sabina

Wait, was there a hell eight this year?

Bobby

No.

Sabina

There, you see, that's what I thought.

Bobby

Huawei had a like a presentation booked at the end, in between hall seven and hall, what was hall eight, but hall eight was closed and they didn't realise. So they walked us from their booth in hall number one, all the way through to hall number eight. And there's about 10 minutes of arguing with the guard there about let us into hall eight which looked basically closed. It looked a little bit like if we walked through that door we would just fall out the end of the building. The guy was like this is hall eight, this is where we are and they couldn't get an answer but they've got like a mini sort of side section round by seven that they've classed as hall eight. But yeah, it was just a very frustrating afternoon wasted walking all that way.

Adam

Yeah, I can imagine, because it's, how long would you say it takes to walk from one end to the other?

Bobby

It depends on the route you take, because I didn't time them. But you could go through Hall to Hall and through the outside bits, or you can go up the escalators and along the walkway, I think the bit through the hallways where you go through the exits where the the food stores are probably takes a little bit longer because it's kind of curved.

Adam

Yeah, kind of a bit of a wiggly route.

Bobby

Yeah.

Sabina

Yeah, it was, I did find it quite... I mean, I thankfully, with my briefings that I had booked, it did allow me time to walk between, you know, hall one and, for example, hall seven, but honestly, I cannot imagine if, if you had stuff going on at the same time, or like, right, one after the other without that 15 minutes, sort of, like, you know, for the commute, basically I would call it. Yeah, it was, it was it was just massive and, and like I said, I don't think I've ever been in a big physical indoor space like this before. If you don't count like Westfield, or something like that.

Bobby

How did you find the mask restrictions?

Sabina

You know what? I didn't mind it. I mean, I know that you weren't a fan. But I, it definitely helped me feel safer. It definitely helped me feel that no one's spitting in my face while talking to me.

Adam

Always good.

Sabina

Yeah. I felt I mean, because, you know, like, even on the London tube and stuff. When people don't wear masks, they don't wear masks, but also they're not speaking at me. While when you're at a place like this, which is very good for networking, and you get to meet people, you know, and discuss stuff with them. And often it's very loud, so we have to stand quite close to each other. I think it really helps not to get someone's spit in your eye. I don't know. I'm sorry, if I'm being too graphic, you guys. But it also helped me feel way more confidence. Knowing that I don't have to bother about whether I have some lettuce stuck in my teeth after lunch. It's definitely, and also, you know, obviously, the confidence that I'm not gonna, that I'm likely not going to give anyone COVID. So that definitely helped. Yeah, so I mean, I could focus on, you know, getting the sort of like the most out of it without having to worry about the lower half of my face. And and, to be honest, I yeah, I don't mind that. I mean, I'm, I'm quite happy for this to be around at any other tech conference I attend.

Adam

So speaking of which, Sabina, you were looking at the networking side of things. What are the big trends that everyone's talking about this year?

Sabina

For me, it was quite interesting, because if you've read my what to expect piece, I was definitely quite surprised that there wasn't a lot going on about about 6G. I sort of expected about to be more involved on the agenda given about 2019 was definitely mostly dominated by, I mean, from what I heard, was definitely a 5G sort of like year, but I stand corrected. You know, like, while speaking to a lot of people within the industry, especially telecoms, they told me all about how 5G is definitely, we are literally we're definitely only at the beginning of the 5G road. And there's so much, every one of them agreed with a statement that there's still so much unrealized potential to 5G and that 6G won't be even considered considered seriously until very later on in this decade, in the decade. So they were all saying that, you know, that 6G, despite there being quite a lot of research into into 6G. I wouldn't say a lot. But there is research going into 6G and I thought that this would be an emerging technology, which, which will be which would grab people's attention, but yeah, but I was wrong. And 5G, there's definitely a lot to it. And that's definitely what people were focusing on.

Adam

It's worth bearing in mind as well, that the length of time that it takes to develop these kinds of technologies and these kind of standard increases. is enormous. 5G was in development for years and years before. Yeah, yeah. And it's still not really finished kind of even rolling out fully.

Sabina

Oh, definitely. Yes. Yes. And yeah, like you're yeah, completely. Now I am like fully aware of the fact that these like mobile generations are more like 10 years each. I had previously I was hoping that, you know, maybe not hoping but like I was thinking about with the technological progress and advances that this length of time between generations is shortening because we have so much more technology available. And I guess sort of like the demand for progress is much greater. But but there is that 10 year gap between between mobile generations definitely is still very much in pace. And, and 5G is still very much, it's only the tip of the iceberg from from what everyone told me.

Adam

So are there any new technologies on the horizon that businesses should be keeping an eye on, if not 6G?

Sabina

I would focus more on on Wi-Fi 7. Nowadays, we mostly see Wi-Fi 6, in plenty of new offerings. And Wi-Fi 7 isn't considered very mainstream, in fact, there's only, it's only been properly announced last year. So I found it extremely surprising that Qualcomm is now rolling out the world's first Wi-Fi 7 chip, which basically is in its sampling stage. Now the technology is available, but we'll see it in devices in the second half of this year. The it's going to offer very low latency of less than two milliseconds and meaning that this that the peak speeds of 5.8 gigabits per second will help power use cases in the metaverse and an extended reality, which was very big this year. Although I unfortunately heard about the fun little roller coaster that was one of the stands in hall three, which basically allowed you to put on these sort of like, virtual reality glasses and you sat in a chair, which was being like, you know, moved around, like like a roller coaster basically. Apparently, I got I got info from someone that this was around at the 2019 MWC as well, but this year just slapped a Metaverse title on it, so. So I don't know Bobby, maybe correct me if I'm wrong. But this is literally the opinion that I heard from from someone. Yeah, so definitely, Wi-Fi 7 is big.

Adam

Yeah, I'm really interested in the kind of development of Wi-Fi 6e and Wi-Fi 7. Because yeah, as you as you mentioned Sabina, Wi-Fi 6 still is in the really kind of early stages. Support for it is included on most smartphones and laptops that come out these days. But the vast majority of actual networking equipment that is kind of in use and deployed, whether that's, you know, in people's homes or in business networks, for the most part, is still on, you know, Wi-Fi five and older standards. So I would be really interested to see how far the rollout of Wi-Fi 6 needs to progress before we can start really thinking about Wi-Fi 7 on a kind of mass scale.

Sabina

That's a good question. From what I see like in our latest sort of like reviews, a lot of new releases are Wi-Fi 6. And I think it's very interesting that we now we are now getting a new, the world's first essentially Wi-Fi 7 chip. And it is likely to be seen in devices from Acer, from Asus' phone, I think Asus Asus' phone division, Honor, Oppo, Xiaomi and Tencent; we're going to be seeing Wi-Fi 7 in their devices by the end of this year. So it is a good question as to why now. It would be it will be interesting to see whether it catches on and whether we'll essentially just do this leap into Wi-Fi 7 by the start of 2023.

Adam

So as well as networking, MWC is also the place to get first looks at some of the most interesting upcoming devices. So let's move on to the hardware, then. Bobby, can you talk us through some of your highlights from the show?

Bobby

So there was a lot on display, both virtually and physically there. But there is a slight problem with those that were virtual. So you get you know, pretty pictures, glorious little video and a load of specs. But without being able to get hands on it, we can't say how good it was. And you really can't get that excited about it. So we got our hands on Samsung products, the Samsung Galaxy Book Pro 360 And I thought that was fantastic. It's great. I loved it. But then I also loved the Lenovo Arm ThinkPad but I didn't get to see it. I didn't get to use it. And then they've given us this great statistic that it lasts for 29 hours of battery life; that would have been perfect to play with, but because they weren't there, and it's understandable that they weren't there, it's a big Chinese company, tough restrictions in China, you can understand they're not there. But they, it does feel like those that were not there didn't get much help from the fact that they weren't there. And yeah, interestingly enough, the best device on show was not a handset or a laptop, it was actually a charger. So this also fits into the narrative of those that weren't there and those that were there because in the morning on Monday, Realme introduced an Ultra Dart Charger. It's 150 Watt, boom, charges your phone, five minutes, 50% full. But by the afternoon, that had been doubled, I think, almost doubled, by Oppo with their prototype for a Super VOOC charger, 240 Watts, which charges the phone in nine minutes from zero to full.

Adam

Yeah, that's insane.

Bobby

It is. But it's a prototype. So it's not for the Oppo Find X5, it's for an unnamed device that hopefully will be released sometime next year. And they had sort of prototypes on display. Now you can kind of tell how good the products were by how popular they were. And that was the most popular device there. Just like a little prototype, stuck the charger in and it would go really quickly. So quick that they had to have three separate prototypes, and then they had to drain the batteries before other people could use them.

Adam

That's amazing. Yeah. I mean, I'd be worried about my phone catching fire if something was charging it that quickly. I mean, it does. It does sound amazing. But I have questions about the impact on device longevity, if you're hammering the recharge that fast.

Bobby

Yeah, there was, this was brought up by a number of journalists that we were there with. See, Oppo say they've got a solution that they've worked on, that takes into account the charger, the cable and the phone. So there's a control chip that manages voltage and current and temperature, but also this new phone, whatever it is, has got temperature sensors. So that kind of suggests that this is not going to be available for any old phone.

Adam

No. So I mean, I would I would go so far as to say that it's probably the kind of thing where it actively won't work if you're trying to use it on on a kind of on a device that it's not specced for. Either that or it'll limit, it will throttle the the voltage that it puts out to kind of, quote unquote safe level so that you know, you don't plug your Samsung phone or your Pixel into it and just have it detonate.

Bobby

Yeah, that'd be mad. But um...

Adam

I mean, I remember the Note 7. So yeah, the last thing anyone wants to do is recreate that.

Bobby

That was terrible.

Adam

That was not good.

Bobby

But charging speed is quite notable at the event, because a lot of the phones that we did see still had quite high voltage levels. So the OnePlus and Oppo phones, presumably they've got the same people working on them. But they were both had 80 Watt fast chargers, which is up from the 65 Watt fast charger on the OnePlus 9 Pro. I remember that flying through charging speeds.

Adam

Well charging speeds is one of those one of those areas where we can still kind of make progress. I feel like a lot of other areas of smartphone development have kind of plateaued to a large extent, there's not really much benefit to increasing the screen resolution beyond what it is at the moment. Refresh rates are, you know, creeping up, getting to things like you know, 60 hertz, and 120 Hertz in higher end devices. But again, that's kind of not necessarily particularly essential. And the processing power of modern smartphones is already way beyond what the average user needs for it. So battery technology is basically the last frontier where making improvements is going to be a genuine benefit.

Bobby

And all those other ones you mentioned affect the battery. So particularly the refresh rate, because I mean in recent times, I think, overall smartphone battery life has dropped by maybe a couple of hours here and there. And it's partly because they have to, you know, accommodate for these changing refresh rates all the time. So yeah, there is still room for it to fix it.

Adam

So of the technology that you saw at the show, which do you think business folks are going to be most interested in?

Bobby

Well, I myself was quite interested in the Huawei MateStation X, which is a new desktop. Part of the reason I was interested was the software that's on it, which is also available on all of the other Huawei laptops and tablets. So this is called Super Device and it lets you link up all your tablets to get, well not all of your tablets, but it lets you link say your Matebook X Pro to your Matestation for that extra screenspace. And it's all wirelessly. And what it is, is a little user interface that kind of looks like pebbles in water. So one, one main one in the middle there is called your MateStation X, and you find another pebble if it's available in the area. And you just sort of collide them together, and they link up . So the people at Huawei showed me this with the phone. So on your massive MateStation X screen, you get like your phone's interface. Or if you get your tablet, you've got like a an S Pen, you can start drawing on your tablet and it'll appear on the MateStation screen. Or if you're using your MateStation, sorry, Matebook X Pro, you can start typing away and it'll appear as a monitor on the MateStation X, it's all perfectly seamless and easy. It was just exciting to see that as a home office setup. I went there and I went I want that for my home office basically.

Adam

And that's, that's always the sign of a successful product. It's that that whole device ecosystem idea is a very interesting one to me, because it's something that a lot of companies are are trying to get into. Apple has been doing it very successfully for many years with, you know, iPhone, iPad, iMac, all across the range, Huawei is doing it, Samsung is trying to get into it, admittedly at a kind of earlier stage. But it's something that I don't know is super necessary these days. I mean, the wireless screen sharing, and wireless display extension is good and interesting and the kind of thing that I can imagine being very convenient, I'm not sure I'd buy into an entire device ecosystem just on the strength of that, though.

Bobby

Perhaps not. You're right with a Samsung one. I saw the Samsung one first. And it kind of didn't really excite me that much. But you can basically take the new Galaxy Book range, and you can pair them with a tablet, and you get limited screen space. But you can also control your tablet with your trackpad on your Galaxy Book, which is fairly nice. But it was just the way that Huawei showed theirs off that was more exciting and more like wow, this has blown my mind, kind of thing.

Adam

Is it just the user interface that's attracting you to it?

Bobby

I think it is a little bit. The The other problem was, is the MateStation X itself was good. But I imagine there's better all in one desktops available. It wasn't a brilliant, brilliant desktop, it was a good one.

Adam

So the MateStation X is almost identical design wise to the MateView monitor, which I really, really like. It's I really like the hinge design, I really like the 3x2 aspect ratio. I really like the quality of the screen itself. I thought it was just really nice and, and polished. To be fair, as is most of Huawei's computing equipment, but it's going to come down to price for me, because premium all in ones really are going up against the iMac. And that is tough, that's a tough act to follow, you've got the iMac and you've got the Surface Studio. And you need to be either significantly more affordable. Or you need to be at the absolute top of your game. If you want to seriously rival either of those two machines.

Bobby

I suppose the other problem they might have is that the software allows you to just link your tablet or your MateBook X to just a monitor. So you don't really, if you can already do that, you're not going to spend more on MateStation X with a keyboard and a wireless mouse that they didn't really go into much detail about.

Adam

I mean, you know, at the end of the day, it's a keyboard and a mouse. Do you know what I mean? There's there's very rarely anything particularly exciting you can you can say about either of those two technologies. You know, I mean, don't get me wrong. I love a good a good keyboard as much as the next tech nerd. But unless you start getting into, you know, talking about individual key switches and all of that kind of stuff, which let's face it, no one really cares about. It's just, yeah, it's a keyboard. Does it look alright? Is it wireless? Grand.

Bobby

But this is the thing, if you've if you've already got a laptop from Huawei, and then you want to get bigger screen space show the cheaper monitor is the better option.

Adam

Oh absolutely. This the MateStation will be for hot desking setups, I would imagine is the, certainly from a business perspective, that's going to be where most people are going to be interested in it, I would expect, is companies looking to outfit you know, an entire office with machines that they can just plop workers down in front of and they can just pick it up and go. And then they can also use their company issue phones or tablets or whatever to kind of interact with nice, agile, flexible way.

Bobby

Yeah, although Huawei phones would present somewhat of a problem for businesses.

Adam

That's very true.

Sabina

From what I, from what I know, Bobby, you might be you might know more about this. But Huawei rolled out a very similar tool a couple of years ago, which basically allowed users to pair their devices and just, you know, effortlessly move files from one screen to another screen of a different device. And Adam, we tested this out a few weeks ago, remember with tablets and my, between between a Huawei tablet and a Huawei laptop, and I found this amazing. I've never seen, I never used anything like this before.

Bobby

This is the one hop feature.

Sabina

Yeah.

Adam

This is the Huawei share thing, I believe?

Sabina

Yeah, the Huawei share. It's, I think it's great. And I love that they're now expanding it to, I think, include as many as five devices at a time or even more. But I think I think it's great, because it's because it basically allows you to do the same work without changing devices, I often find myself making a design, for example, our Instagram page, I make the design on our laptop, and when I have to switch to my phone in order to download it onto my phone and post it from our Instagram account on, you know, my smartphone device, which essentially I would love to for this to be comprised on one device. This essentially, this tool from Huawei essentially allows you to do the same editing, to do editing on one device and have it saved on the other one that you will be using, if you know what I mean. So basically, if you have a file on your phone, you can open it from your laptop, edit it there, and then have it saved on your phone again. I think that's amazing.

Bobby

I really like it too. I've always felt this with Huawei, if they've got anything over everyone else, it's their controls. And their sharing files. It's all really innovative. So like on the old Matebook X Pro, you can screenshot with three fingers and stuff like that. And yeah, that's now on the new one as well, the new model, where you can use your knuckle to double tap your keypad, screenshot, you can just lift your finger up the left hand side of the trackpad, it turns up the volume or the other side turns up the brightness, run your finger across the top, it speeds up video. it's all really cool. Yeah, if only we got one of those models.

Sabina

I wish I wish these things were available in more in more offerings. Like I just checked, and I don't think there's essentially, you know, that big of a limit on I think the devices that you can pair because it includes mobile phones, tablets, monitors, smart TVs, anything whether it's compatible, basically with the Huawei interface, and it doesn't matter whether it's Windows operating system or the Huawei Huawei Huawei phone operating system. It's all sort of it's all linked seamlessly throughout these and the transfer, you know, transferring files is very easy. As I can personally attest. At the same time, Huawei rolled out sets that you can buy, so you can buy these devices in bundles and have it ready for you, which is very convenient, I guess for big organisations equipping the workforce with adequate, you know, adequate hardware.

Adam

So conferences like this are always a good benchmark for what's happening in the wider industry. With that in mind, what are your main takeaways from this year's Mobile World Congress - Sabina?

Sabina

My, my main takeaway is that the tech industry hasn't been obliterated by COVID-19. And that it's still willing to put on a show and put on massive, massive events, with plenty of people, despite a raging pandemic going on, still, after two years, and I think that not even not even COVID-19 will stop the tech industry. I mean, we've seen that. I mean, obviously that's nothing new. But with event planning, you would think that, I remember two years ago when everybody said about oh, you know, like in physical events are over now. We'll only be doing them from home. Wow, isn't that great? You don't have to leave your home to do things. And I kept thinking, No, that sucks. Actually. I want and I'm very happy that we get to we get to see the world and we get to meet people from different companies based in different headquarters all over the world. And we get to explore those parts and see seeing you see a new face to it every single year. And I'm hoping that this continues in the long run.

Bobby

I have kind of similar sentiments. I was really happy to be out again, very happy to be out with Sabina as well, really enjoyed your company. It's great to be with other journalists again, for a first tech event as well, you did really well. I mean, did you read the Ukraine story that she posted?

Adam

Yeah, that was a really, really interesting bit of reporting that we will link to in the show notes.

Bobby

So yeah, it was nice to get out and meet people again, and talk face to face. And you know, we we do tend to go out on late nights as well on these press trips, and you get more of a informal chat with your, your hosts. And it's always nice to get new insights and different angles on stories and new interesting things that they say. And I just loved every minute of being there. Even even long walks across eight different halls.

Sabina

Seven!

Bobby

Seven different halls. Yeah. Hall eight doesn't exist.

Sabina

No.

Adam

it's mythical.

Sabina

Yeah, I think at the end of the day, I think the smaller capacity this year allowed people to be more, to have this more individual approach and for people to connect a bit more, because maybe the number of meetings was slightly reduced, I guess, or maybe even provided people with a greater chance to schedule in something that they originally wouldn't do. If if not for, you know, a slightly smaller scale. So it, I think it provided more opportunity for people to be more direct with each other. And I think this is really what we need after the last two years of being on Zoom calls.

Adam

Yeah, absolutely. I can certainly say from my own experience, having less people at an event like that would have made it much easier to to actually get round, see all the things that you want to see, cause there is a fabulous amount there to, to experience and to discover, but being able to actually get round everything and see everything and talk to everyone that you want to to meet and talk to, without having to fight through, you know, 100,000 plus people would have significantly improved the experience from my perspective.

Bobby

So that is probably going to be what international events are going to look like now, that virtual mix. So that kind of means that 2019's MWC is probably going to be its peak, attendance wise. I think that's over 100,000 people that came to that one. And I certainly for Europe, I don't think we're going to get anything on the scale of that ever again. But it's not necessarily a bad thing, I don't think.

Adam

Yeah, I think as Sabina was saying, it's a it's a good opportunity to give people more space to actually make relationships and to connect with, you know, their their peers and their partners and their and their colleagues. So yeah, I think it's, it's nice to have the option of doing that in person, but maybe in slightly less persons than previously. Well, sadly, we'll have to put MWC behind this for another year as we're almost out of time for this week. But thanks to Bobby and Sabina for joining us.

Bobby

Thank you.

Sabina

Thank you for having us.

Adam

You can find links to all of the topics we've spoken about today in the show notes, and even more on our website, itpro.co.uk You can also follow us on social media as well as subscribe to our daily newsletter. And don't forget to subscribe to the IT Pro Podcast wherever you find podcasts. If you're enjoying the show, leave us a rating and a review. We'll be back next week with more analysis from the world of IT, but until then, goodbye.

Bobby

Goodbye.

Sabina

Bye.

MWC is back; after a few years in hibernation, the trade show has once again opened its doors to the mobile industry, with thousands of exhibitors and attendees flocking to Barcelona to check out the latest products and technologies.

This year’s show saw everything from new laptops and smartphones, to developments in network infrastructure and wireless standards. Bobby Hellard and Sabina Weston join us this week to share some of the most interesting things they saw at the show, including Qualcomm’s first Wi-Fi 7 chip, a new all-in-one from Huawei, and a charger that can fill your phone up in just a few minutes.

Highlights

“Size wise, it's nowhere near as big as what it was in 2019. I'm not sure on the attendance figures, but there was a lot less than what it was before the pandemic. And we just had more virtual presentations. So companies like Realme and Lenovo, they chose to give us video showcases but they didn't actually attend. So that's completely different from 2019. Lenovo had one of the biggest stands in 2019, but they had no presence this year.”

“Nowadays, we mostly see Wi-Fi 6, in plenty of new offerings. And Wi-Fi 7 isn't considered very mainstream; in fact, it's only been properly announced last year. So I found it extremely surprising that Qualcomm is now rolling out the world's first Wi-Fi 7 chip, which basically is in its sampling stage. Now the technology is available, but we'll see it in devices in the second half of this year. It's going to offer very low latency of less than two milliseconds and the peak speeds of 5.8 gigabits per second will help power use cases in the metaverse and in extended reality, which was very big this year.”

“Interestingly enough, the best device on show was not a handset or a laptop, it was actually a charger. So this also fits into the narrative of those that weren't there and those that were there, because in the morning on Monday, Realme introduced an Ultra Dart Charger. It's 150 Watt, boom, charges your phone, five minutes, 50% full. But by the afternoon, that had been doubled, I think, or almost doubled, by Oppo with their prototype for a Super VOOC charger, 240 Watts, which charges the phone in nine minutes from zero to full.”

Read the full transcript here.

Footnotes

• Why I’m getting cold feet over the lack of tech conferences
• IT Pro Panel: The post-COVID future of tech conferences
• Aruba unveils enterprise-grade Wi-Fi 6E
• D-Link Nuclias DBA-X1230P review: Pricey but powerful
• OnePlus 10 Pro hands-on review: A solo Pro with little sparkle
• Huawei MateStation X hands-on review: All aboard for productivity
• Huawei MateView review: A stunning, innovative screen – but it’s expensive
• Samsung Galaxy Book2 Pro 360 hands-on review: 360 degrees of portability
• View from the airport: Networking at MWC 2022
• View from the airport: Hardware at MWC 2022
• Sony pulls out of MWC 2022
• What devices can we expect from MWC 2022?
• Wi-Fi 7 and XR to set the agenda at MWC 2022
• MWC 2022: Qualcomm announces “world’s first” 5G AI and Wi-Fi 7 chips
• MWC 2022: Lenovo unveils its first Arm-based ThinkPad boasting 29 hour battery life
• MWC 2022: Huawei's Super Device ecosystem lets business users work seamlessly across devices
• MWC 2022: Ukrainian protesters call for Russian tech boycott
• Mobile World Congress cancelled amid coronavirus crisis
• How the Fira de Barcelona is bringing Wi-Fi 6 to some of Europe's biggest events
• MWC 2022 | The best new phones, laptops and PCs

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Welcome to IT Pro's News in Review, a weekly bite-sized bulletin of the top tech stories of the week, for the week ending 4 March, 2022.

This week's stories:

• Hacking group leaks Nvidia data following alleged ransomware attack
• MWC 2022: Ukrainian protesters call for Russian tech boycott
• Conti ransomware gang data leaked by Ukrainian cyber researcher

You can find more videos like this in our video library and even more on our YouTube channel. Let us know what you think of this week's video – you can also find us on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.

Ukrainian protesters have descended on Mobile World Congress (MWC) to call for a boycott of Russian technology.

Brandishing the Ukrainian flag and signs calling for “no tech for aggressor”, the group described themselves as Ukrainian citizens heavily concerned about the mounting death toll of the Russian invasion. An estimated 352 Ukrainians, including 14 children, had been killed since Thursday, according to Ukraine’s health ministry.

The protestors, who gathered outside Barcelona's Fira Gran Via, likened paying for a Kaspersky subscription to sponsoring terrorism and also called for Amazon Web Services (AWS) to “shut down” servers used by Russian entities.

“Our goal here is to ask technological communities all over the world to block Russia, to cut off their technology for Russia,” one of the protesters, called Victoria, told IT Pro.

“We want them on one hand not to buy Russian products, and on the other hand, to ban Russia from accessing their product. For example, we are addressing Amazon and if they cut down [the servers for] Russia, it will have a huge impact. We are asking for support,” she added.

AWS dominates the Russian cloud computing market with a 40% share, significantly outnumbering the country’s own cloud service providers such as Yandex and Mail.ru.

According to Victoria, a boycott could contribute significantly to the safety and morale of the Ukrainian people defending their country. She also addressed the contrast between the experiences of this year’s MWC attendees and the people of Ukraine’s second-biggest city Kharkiv, which is under heavy missile attack from Russian forces.

“This would be a huge help because right now, while we are having this technological conference and people are talking about tech right now, at the very same moment Putin is launching missiles on one of the biggest cities in Ukraine. People are dying right now,” she said.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has a looming presence over this year’s MWC, being mentioned in private and during keynote speeches alike, including Qualcomm’s Monday press conference.

In a statement to IT Pro, Kaspersky denied having "ties to any government":

"We are proud to collaborate with the authorities of many countries as well as international law enforcement agencies, including INTERPOL and Europol, in fighting cybercrime. War isn’t good for anyone. We believe that peaceful dialogue is the only possible instrument for resolving conflicts and hope it will lead to a cessation of hostilities," the company said on Wednesday.

AWS wasn't immediately available to comment on the protestors’ pleas, which come amid proactive measures taken by Microsoft, Google, Meta, and Twitter to disrupt the cyber attacks on Ukraine coming from Russian and Belarusian actors.

On Tuesday, Visa and Mastercard became the latest organisations to block Russian banks from their networks amid heavy international sanctions.

PC maker Lenovo has unveiled its first Arm-based ThinkPad, which it claims has been designed with hybrid workers in mind.

Unveiled at Mobile World Congress (MWC), the Lenovo ThinkPad X13s is powered by the new Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3 platform, the first 5nm Windows SoC. The processor is billed as being 85% faster than Qualcomm's 8cx Gen 2 platform and equips the laptop with mmWave 5G connectivity.

The Arm-based platform also offers impressive endurance; according to Lenovo, users can expect up to 29 hours of battery life during video playback from the built-in 49.5 Wh battery.

Elsewhere, the Lenovo ThinkPad X13s takes advantage of the mobility of Qualcomm chip to offer an ultra-thin, fan-less design, which has been made from 90% recycled magnesium. This eco-friendly chassis houses a 13.3-inch 1920 x 1080 display, which is available in three different options that vary based on brightness and touch ability.

Built with hybrid workers in mind, the laptop also features a 5MP webcam with AI-based auto framing, Windows Hello IR for facial recognition, and a triple microphone array with intelligent noise suppression.

For IT departments, the Windows 11 machine also ships with Lenovo Services, which can help with configuration, deployment, management, support and disposal of assets, as well as hardware and software threat protection through the ThinkShield end-to-end security platform.

In terms of ports, the Lenovo ThinkPad X13s is pretty barebones, offering just two USB-C ports for data, display out, and charging, along with a standard 3.5mm headphone and mic jack.

“Thanks to our collaboration with Qualcomm Technologies and Microsoft, we are excited to bring a new generation of work-from-anywhere device with the flexibility, mobility and security that enterprise customers need,” said Jerry Paradise, vice president of Lenovo's Global Commercial Product Portfolio.

“ThinkPad X13s promises to end power anxiety and delight users with AI accelerated collaboration experiences and hyper-speed connectivity wherever they happen to be.”

The ThinkPad X13s will start shipping in May with pricing starting at $1,099. Models with 5G modems will launch later this year.

In addition to the ThinkPad X13s, Lenovo announced numerous Intel- and AMD-based refreshes for the ThinkPad lineup at the MWC, including the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme Gen 5.

This high-end laptop packs up to a 12th-gen Core i9 H-series vPro chip, up to 64GB RAM, an Nvidia RTX 3080 Ti GPU, and a 165Hz display.

Sony has pulled out of next month’s Mobile World Congress (MWC) conference for the third year in a row, in a decision that has been branded as “disappointing” by the organisers.

Scheduled to take place from 28 February to 3 March 2022, the annual event is set to return to Barcelona under the theme of “Connectivity Unleashed”.

Combining in-person and virtual attendance, MWC 2022 will host more than 1,500 exhibitors, including AWS, Lenovo, Nvidia, Samsung, and Intel.

Sony is reportedly the first exhibitor to pull out of next month’s event, with organiser GSMA telling IT Pro that it is “surprised” by the decision. Although no official reason for the cancellation has been given, it's likely a result of ongoing concerns over safety amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

“Whilst this is disappointing, we respect that strategic business decisions by the organisation in 2020 influenced the change and wish them all the best,” it added.

This is the third year in a row that Sony has cancelled its MWC attendance, with GSMA noting that the company “has not been an exhibitor at the event since 2019”.

“Our focus at the GSMA remains producing an unmissable event for all of those attending. We do this with overwhelming support from the industry, Spain, Catalonia, Barcelona and the Host City Parties. We have proven our ability to deliver a safe environment with an industry-leading health and safety plan, Committed Community, and three successful events in 2021,” GSMA told IT Pro.

Sony wasn’t immediately available for comment.

MWC Barcelona has been plagued with exhibitor cancellations since the start of the pandemic, which coincided with its cancelled 2020 event that was supposed to take place between 24 and 27 February.

However, GSMA is positive that this year’s conference will go ahead as planned, with attendees, staff, exhibitors, and visitors required to either undergo Covid-19 testing, or submit proof of vaccination or a valid certificate of recovery. Similarly to last year's event, all participants will also be required to wear a FFP2 (Filtering Facepiece Respirators) mask inside the Fira Gran Via conference centre, which is the venue for MWC. GSMA has also warned that surgical masks and cloth face masks will not be accepted.

Last year, Sony cancelled its attendance just hours after Ericsson officially pulled out of the Barcelona tech conference.

Around this time each year, 100,000 techies storm the city of Barcelona to catch the latest on networking and mobile innovation at Mobile World Congress (MWC). It’s one of the biggest events on the tech calendar, comparable to CES, and for the Fira de Barcelona, it's their bread and butter.

Having hosted MWC for at least the last decade, the venue is purpose-built to service a flowing sea of companies and delegates that swarm through its doors for the week-long event. Sustaining these numbers inevitably brings challenges, however, particularly in the networking arena.

In the run up to this year’s MWC, the venue invested in Wi-Fi 6 technology to beef up its network infrastructure.

Unfortunately, rather than swathes of people flocking to the Fira, its corridors will be eerily empty, following organiser GSMA’s decision to cancel the event amid fears over the COVID-6 corona virus that has caused an epidemic in China and struck others around the world.

Nevertheless, it’s worth considering how Wi-Fi 6 will improve the experience of MWC delegates next year, when the conference hopefully returns, as well as for attendees of other conferences that will take place in the meantime.

“Wi-Fi 6 is revolutionary,” Cisco’s wireless CTO Matt MacPherson, told journalists attending Cisco Live 2020, also hosted by the Fira – although he noted in good humour that we would expect him to say that.

The advent of 5G and its widely-touted possibilities often steals headlines, with the main promises lying in not just a speed boost but also increased network reliability. With the hype train stalling in recent months, however, businesses should perhaps instead look to the benefits that its sister technology can bring – and not just in 12 months time, but now.

Wi-Fi 6 promises opportunities deemed just as exciting as 5G, its advocates suggest, given it’s built on the same underlying fabric; OFEMA. However, its function is not to replace 5G, which operates better at range but to complement the technology.

“In indoor situations or in high density situations, what we know is Wi-Fi hotspots are fantastic,” MacPherson added.

The bandwidth that you can get through on that Wi-Fi network because of the density of those access points is phenomenal.

“Other technologies that are coming out with the advent of Wi-Fi 6 is also something called targeted wait time. So now what we can do is we can actually tell the device, wake up at this time, send your data, and go back to sleep. This means we can dramatically extend battery life.”

Ahead of MWC, it was planned that for the first time the Fira de Barcelona would have installed ready-to-go Wi-Fi 6 across halls five, six and seven, with attendees given the capacity to connect seamlessly.

That was the idea, anyway.

The process of getting the Fira Wi-Fi 6-ready involved just a month or two’s worth of work, which largely comprised physically replacing the wireless access points situated across the relevant sites. Work on the remaining halls is expected to be completed during the summer, during a period in which no events are being hosted.

The key challenges for Carlos Sanchez, who is telco services manager with the Fira de Barcelona, amounts to improving the venue’s network reliability, and eventually transforming the Fira into a “smart venue”.

“Fira is running such big events as Cisco Live, SAP, VMWorld, Mobile World Congress,” Sanchez says. “So, that means to have, in the venue, connectivity for more than 100,000 people. In those terms, Wi-Fi 6 helps us to increase this capacity and allows all these people to be connected at the same time – without impacting on the experience.

“This is very important for us because the Wi-Fi experience, for us a key factor to provide to the external organiser, or to the event organisers.”

Moreover, Sanchez wants to significantly ramp up the data that’s collected and fed back to the organisers.

“That means that all the sensors that we already have in the venue can provide information to the event organisers,” he added. This will give them the tools to set the temperature of the meeting rooms and to monitor the air quality, queues for the taxis and the restaurants, and even if the toilets are clean or not.

Beyond this, Wi-Fi 6 could pave the way for ‘wireless roaming’ much in the same way that users can hop between 4G and 5G networks when travelling abroad, due to some 800,000 roaming agreements struck between network operators. The key to achieving this is by introducing a ‘smart authentication’ procedure that works to eliminate the need for users to manually find the network name and enter the password.

The idea, according to the Wireless Broadband Alliance CEO Tiago Rodrigues, is to simplify connectivity by removing the need to sign in between subsequent networks as people move between venues and their respective networks. It’s one of the ways that this idea of a seamless convergence between 5G and Wi-Fi 6 can be realised.

The core principle is similar to that deployed by one-click social media logins that we encounter when browsing online. Users who are already members of a partnered entity, which could be anything from a bank to a mobile network operator, will find themselves automatically linked up to a Wi-Fi network through a unique ‘digital identity’ without having to cough up any personal details or manually fill out an access form. The network authenticates their identity, and automatically grants the user Wi-Fi access.

The technology was already in force at Cisco Live 2020, with manufacturer Samsung among those partnering to provide users with compatible digital identities. In practice, that means Samsung handset users found themselves automatically and securely connecting to the Fira de Barcelona’s Wi-Fi networks without having to enter any details, and not even necessarily with their knowledge.

What Cisco, the Fira de Barcelona, and organisations like the WBA are trying to achieve is to eradicate “hard breaks” experienced as users hop from 4G and 5G to Wi-Fi. The consequences of these interruptions range from dropping calls to video feeds disconnecting.

“LTE, 5G, has solved this problem; it just connects every time,” Cisco’s MacPherson added.

“Wi Fi didn't. Now, it does. And if you can connect both at the same time as you're going in and out of these menus, it can easily switch in milliseconds between these access technologies, instead of these hard breaks that we experienced before.

“So we're seeing these huge changes happen in the industry where we can really form heterogeneous connectivity. And what we call these 'any net' type connectivity, were you using multiple access technologies to solve your day to day problems."

While we may not get to see this technology in action at MWC, hopefully the next big tech conference in Barcelona will give thousands of people a chance to put it through its paces.

LG has withdrawn from this month’s upcoming Mobile World Congress (MWC) – hosted by GSMA – to protect its employees from the coronavirus outbreak.

“The decision removes the risk of exposing hundreds of LG employees to international travel which has already become more restrictive as the virus continues to spread across borders,” said the company in a statement.

Chinese mobile device and networking equipment manufacturer ZTE was also rumoured to be absent from the conference; the company has since confirmed, however, that it plans to attend.

The MWC will go on despite LG’s exit from the event. GSMA plans to enact several infection control measures for the conference, which include increasing onsite medical support, providing heightened disinfection programmes for high-volume touchpoints, and relaying public health advice and guidelines to all participating members.

GSMA further expanded upon its initial proposal yesterday to include a ‘no handshake’ policy, which will be enforced throughout the event.

Although LG’s exit from the MWC indicates ballooning international concern, the coronavirus’ impact has already disrupted major supply chain production across China, where the outbreak started. Factory closures that began at Chinese New Year have been extended to 10 February in order to try and halt the spread of the virus.

The chance for a timely reopening diminishes as the death toll continues to rise, with municipal lockdowns hampering the transportation of people and supplies throughout the country. Primary iPhone supplier and Apple partner Hon Hai Precision Industry recently cut its original 2020 revenue growth outlook from a 3-5% range to 1-3% in response factory closures.

“Hon Hai’s lower 2020 sales growth outlook likely reflects the severity of disruption to its operations from the coronavirus outbreak,” noted Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Matthew Kanterman. “The NT $111 billion reduction in sales at the midpoint of the range vs. the prior midpoint is equivalent to one week of revenue, accounting for the extended factory shutdown imposed by the Chinese government.”

Mobile World Congress is usually an exciting occasion, full of impressive tech and shiny devices.While this year's show played host to a fair number of smartphone launches, some of the most interesting things came from the enterprise side of the conference, with advances in 5G and other areas of innovation.

With another year gone, we've rounded up our picks of the best bits of the show, from new flagship smartphones to technical achievements. Read on to learn more about our favouriteproducts and technologies at MWC 2018.

Asus Zenfone 5Z

The first thing that jumps out about Asus's latest smartphone is how visually similar it is to Apple's iPhone X - it's even got 'The Notch' at the top of the screen. Dislike for The Notch aside, it's a very attractive device, and offers iPhone X-style looks for half the price.

That's not why it's worthy of claiming an award, though. No, it wins one of our Best In Show awards because it gives you a cutting-edge Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 processor and an edge-to-edge display for an asking price of just 500. That's a good deal by any measure.

Samsung Galaxy S9

After the Galaxy S8 was such a runaway success last year, all eyes were on Samsung to see whether the Galaxy S9 could continue the company's winning streak. The Korean giant took the lid off its new device on the Sunday before the show, and sure enough, it looks set to be the best phone of 2018.

There's very little that's especially new about the Galaxy S9, but that's a good thing. Samsung has listened to feedback from customers, taken it on board and tweaked the S9's design to reflect the changes they want. It's more of a minor revision than a full-blown successor, but the S9 promises to have sanded off what few rough edges the Galaxy S8 had.

Samsung DeX Pad

One of the most surprising features of the Galaxy S8 was its ability to transform into a full-on thin client solution through Samsung's DeX Station. The company has now releasedthe DeX Pad, which improves upon the best bits of the original DeX and adds some nifty new features.

Among them is support for multiple resolutions, the ability to apply corporate branding to DeX, and - best of all - the ability to use the S9 itself as a touchpad when it's connected without a mouse. You lose a port or two, admittedly, but throw in the fact that it's smaller, lighter and cheaper than the original, and you've got a real winner.

Qualcomm X50 5G modem

Qualcomm has been talking about its 5G efforts for a while, which includes the X50 5G modem. It's only recently, however, that we've actually seen its performance in proper tests. The chip managed 5G download speeds of 4.5Gbits/sec in tests conducted a few weeks prior to MWC, and it managed to maintain those speeds when we saw it tested at the show.

Although we're not hugely confident in the ability of network operators to roll out timely support for 5G technology, Qualcomm is painfully close to making 5G-compatible hardware a reality on the manufacturer side.

HP Envy X2

The HP Envy X2, first unveiled at this year's CES, is part of the first crop of Microsoft's OEM partnerships to create ultraportables powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon processors.

Reminiscent of HP's Elite X2, the Envy X2 is a razor-thin detachable that promises a 20-hour battery life and 4G connectivity, twinned with the productivity features of a standard Windows laptop. If it can strike the right balance, it could be a real game-changer.

HTC Vive Wireless Adaptor

While VR is being touted as the future by many, others are sceptical about how useful it's going to be, given that high-end VR headsets require you to be lashed to a PC in order to drive smooth, high-fidelity visuals. Thanks to HTC's Wireless Adaptor (originally announced at CES 2018), this concern is no longer an issue.

Based on Intel's WiGig technology, this accessory allows you to use the HTC Vive with no wires, other than a single battery pack. Performance is smooth and seamless, and the technology could genuinely make VR practical enough to reach widespread adoption.

Western Digital PC SN720

Western Digital is up there with some of the best in the business when it comes to storage technologies, and the company is pushing forwards with a new SSD built to take advantage of 3D NAND storage architecture. The drives aren't currently being made available for consumers, but are instead being offered to selected OEM clients.

The Western Digital PC SN720 is the first drive to be built on the company's new NVMe SSD controller architecture, which is designed to harness the performance and scalability boosts offered by 3D NAND. Performance looks to be very impressive indeed, and if this is an indication of what the company's new firmware and architecture can do, we're expecting big updates to WD's data centre portfolio.

Chinese manufacturer Huawei attempted to increase its presence in the notebook market last year with the MateBook E, the MateBook D and the original MateBook X, which were released to relatively little fanfare. While the devices themselves were capable, they didn't generally make much of a splash.

For 2018, the company is looking to change that. Its new laptop, the MateBook X Pro, has got the MacBook Pro squarely in its crosshairs, and is aiming to take its place as the go-to business device.

Huawei MateBook X Pro hands-on: Design

Credit where credit's due - the MateBook X Pro is an attractive machine. The metal unibody chassis sports the same sleek, semi-gloss finish as the MacBook Pro, but it's subtle and understated in a very un-Huawei way. It's available in space grey and silver, and aside from the logo on the lid, there are no extraneous design flourishes and no garish detailing. It's almost minimalist, and it looks every inch the business machine.

It's not a particularly petite PC though. A weight of 1.3kg is tipping the scales ever-so-slightly to the wrong side of average, as is the 14.6mm thickness. It's not a bulky machine, by any means, but it's more in line with what we'd expect from a mid-range notebook.

Huawei MateBook X Pro hands-on: Keyboard and trackpad

The similarities to the MacBook Pro don't end at the design. The MateBook X Pro's keyboard is also very reminiscent of the one used by Apple, with large keys and minimal travel distance. Given that the MacBook Pro remains one of the best examples of notebook typing, this is a very good thing indeed. These keys need a little bit more actuation force than the MacBook Pro's, but overall the keyboard is pleasant and fluid to use.

The same is true of the glass-coated trackpad, which also borrows inspiration from the MacBook Pro. Like Apple's device, the MateBook X Pro's trackpad is huge - in fact, Huawei claims it's the largest trackpad ever fitted to a 14in machine.

Huawei MateBook X Pro hands-on: Display

If the MateBook X Pro has a piece de resistance, this is it. Huawei has made a point of emphasising how proud it is of this display and we have to say that we can see why. For starters, the screen looks huge - much like Dell's XPS 13, the MateBook X Pro's screen bezels are barely there. The MateBook X Pro has a 91% screen-to-body ratio, which means that the so-called 'FullView display' is expansive and immersive.

Quality looks to be pretty good too - we couldn't put it through too many tests or measure its colour accuracy but there weren't any immediately noticeable problems, and colours look rich and vivid. The 3,000 x 2,000 resolution ensures that detail should be pin-sharp as well. It's a touchscreen panel, but while we're still not convinced of the utility of touchscreens on traditional clamshells, it's nice to have - and it's protected by Gorilla Glass to guard against drops.

Huawei MateBook X Pro hands-on: Specs and performance

If you're expecting the MateBook X Pro to be a poor relation in terms of internal components, then think again. It's available in two configurations, both fitted with 8th-generation Intel chips. At the top end is the Core i7-8550U model, with 16GB of RAM, a 512GB PCIe SSD and a dedicated Nvidia MX150 GPU. There's also a lower-end model, with a Core i5-8250U, 8GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD, although there's no discrete graphics chip in this one.

It feels nippy enough in use, although we haven't had a chance to put it through any particularly rigorous testing yet. Based on what we've seen of Intel's latest processor family so far, though, expect it to be very speedy indeed.

Huawei MateBook X Pro hands-on: Ports and features

One thing we're glad Huawei hasn't borrowed from Apple is an over-reliance on USB-C. The MateBook X Pro does have two USB Type-C ports (one of which supports Thunderbolt 3), there's also a traditional USB 3.0 port for connecting flash drives and peripherals. Biometric login is taken care of too, thanks to a fingerprint reader built into the power button.

By far the weirdest feature of the MateBook X Pro, however, is its webcam which is not - as you might reasonably expect - housed above the screen. Instead, it's located within the keyboard, recessed into a neat little housing that pops up when you press it.

This allows you to hide it from view when not in use, which Huawei says is to address security concerns like hackers using webcams to spy on victims. It's a clever idea, and helps to keep the webcam out of the way - although it does mean that it'll probably be angled at your chest on the rare occasions when you do use it.

One last feature is the microphones. Huawei has demonstrated its commitment to framing the MateBook X Pro as a business machine by including four microphones, which are designed for conference calls with multiple people in one room and can pick up sound through 360 degrees.

Huawei MateBook X Pro hands-on: Verdict

The Huawei MateBook X Pro is an interesting device and does show some promise. However, there's one giant problem the price. The top-end MateBook X Pro with 16GB of RAM and a Core i7 process costs 1,899, which translates to a whopping 1,672.

While the MateBook X Pro is attractive, and looks to be a fairly nippy machine, we're really not sure it's impressive enough to justify dropping the best part of two grand on, especially when you can pick up a MacBook Pro for the same kind of money.

We'll be able to come to a final conclusion once we've had a chance to run the MateBook X Pro through our tests, but based on what we've seen so far, it looks like a mis-step for the Chinese manufacturer; it's just too expensive for a company without an existing pedigree in laptop construction.

It's that time of year again, when hordes of eager tech fans descend on Barcelona for GSMA's annual Mobile World Congress event.

In previous years, this conference has become famous for being the place where all of the major smartphone manufacturers launch their new flagship devices, with a slew of announcements and news from the likes of HTC, Motorola, LG and others.

Recently, however, fewer and fewer companies have used the show as a launchpad for their devices, choosing instead to hold their own separate events. This year's event promises more of the same, with a comparatively small number of new smartphones in relation to previous years.

There are a couple of major exceptions, though. First and foremost is the Samsung Galaxy S9, which is all but confirmed to be debuting at MWC. Considering that it follows one of the most critically-acclaimed phones of last year (which holds the honour of being IT Pro's Smartphone of the Year 2017), the Galaxy S9 is very much the one to watch, as fans wait to see whether it will be as much of a leap forward as its predecessor.

Aside from that, new devices are expected from Huawei and Sony, and rumours indicate that HMD will be launching a number of new Nokia flagships, following the brand's unexpected revival last year.

Elsewhere, expect a fair number of new wearable devices, as well as a handful of new accessories and peripherals, and possibly even a laptop or two.

Of course, MWC isn't just about smart devices and consumer tech - the conference is also one of the year's main events for the telco industry. Network providers, networking specialists, infrastructure firms, security companies and more will also be flocking to Barcelona to show off the latest advancements that keep all those shiny smartphones ticking along.

The big topics, as with many conferences in the last year or so, are going to be 5G, AI and IoT. Network providers are currently racing to be the first to deploy commercially-viable 5G, and while no-one's really there yet, expect many companies to be making bold claims about how close they are.

IoT, meanwhile, is a much more tangible prospect. IoT systems are already in place in a larger number of businesses, and while IoT technology is still fairly nascent, it's received an encouraging level of buy-in throughout the industry. We're predicting a number of announcements from various companies across the IoT space, although we likely won't see anything truly revolutionary.

All in all, this year's Mobile World Congress promises to be a less exciting affair than some of its predecessors, but although there's little to get the heart racing, the industry is quietly setting the scene for some major shifts in the next couple of years. It may not be exciting, but it might well be the future.

Enterprises are choosing to roll out business-focused applications onto iOS-based devices, even with the extra concerns the Apple platform brings.

In an interview with IT Pro at this year's Mobile World Congress event, Antenna - which focuses on the Fortune 500 level of business - claimed its own customers were looking to the iPhone and iPad, rather than more traditional corporate devices.

"The majority of the apps our customers build are iOS apps," claimed Jim Somers, chief marketing and strategy officer at Antenna.

"Even the old line companies are realising they have to embrace Apple and make sure their apps work on the devices."

Ken Parmelee, senior director of product management at the firm, said the ongoing consumerisation of IT is leaving enterprises little choice but to build apps able to run on Apple.

"There are concerns around security.... and the idea of putting a corporate app on the app store, as well as the arduous approval process," he said.

"[But] the IT guys are saying I have to deal with iOS because it is what everyone is bringing in to my environment.'"

Antenna launched its latest product AMPChroma last week. It enables businesses to build applications through a SaaS model, then easily rolling it out to numerous devices.

Both Somers and Parmelee claimed it was the extra level of management they provided that enabled customers to worry less about the corporate issues of Apple, agreeing this was the reason for the recent influx of third parties getting involved with app development.

"We can create a store front for the customer so they bypass the App Store," said Somers. "We can manage all the security, from data encryption to device security, and we can keep that customer safe, whichever device they use."

AMPChroma recognises 10,000 different IP devices and renders to the screen automatically, rather than a developer having to program several versions of the same application.

Windows Phone will take market share from Android and is more open than Apple, according to the head of Nokia.

Stephen Elop, the Finnish firm's chief executive, said the Windows Phone mobile operating system was well placed in "the war of the ecosystems" his company and Microsoft launched last year, with competition in the mobile market fundamentally changing.

"No longer [is] it better to compete on a device to device basis," he claimed, during his keynote speech at Mobile World Congress. "The real forces have become the ecosystems, including Apple and Android."

He began with praise for the rival companies but Elop soon let his loyalties show.

"Apple forged the ecosystem approach when it launched the iPhone with iTunes... but they took a truly Apple approach and kept their ecosystem quite closed," he said. "This closed approach then created a vacuum in the industry."

"Google took this vacuum, saw a gap in the market... and took an open approach. It remains to be seen how open and how long it will last... but we realised we needed to shift our strategy."

A year after the Microsoft and Nokia partnership was announced, Elop is pleased with how things were growing. He took to the stage for a panel discussion with rival CEO Peter Chou of HTC and, whilst admitting growth wasn't at the speed of light, he claimed it was steady.

"What we are seeing is a very, very steady growth," said Elop. "I look at numbers everyday... but the critical thing we are focused on is making sure what people like and don't like [especially] in the retail shops around the world."

"The thing that excites us a great deal is if one of those devices goes into someone's hand and they have just a few minutes [with it], they say wow, this is a different point of view. So our focus is getting those devices in people's hands."

Chou agreed the experience of Windows Phone was great, with his own company shipping devices running the mobile OS, but would not be drawn on saying whether it could ever reach the same heights as Apple and Android.

"Although the overall market share is slow, the people who use the device [have] very high satisfaction," he said.

"I don't know [if it will be on a par], I am not fortune teller, but I believe it will be a strong operating system... and I believe it will catch up."

Elop concluded that Nokia in partnership with Microsoft were going after one firm and were going to make an impact.

"Our number one focus is competing with Android," he said, "but the one doesn't stop us going after different [manufacturers] either."

"It is the design [that] really does matter, because of the sea of charcoal grey Android pieces of glass. [Design] is something you will see everyone increase on because the homogeny isn't good for the industry."

Mobile payments are one of the hot topics at this year's Mobile World Congress event in Barcelona, but it seems businesses, rather than consumers, are being the first to get on board.

This was the claim made by Don Callahan, chief operations and technology officer at Citigroup. During his keynote presentation, the financial executive claimed mobile payments in the B2B sector had reached almost $400 trillion thanks to his firm's focus on corporate concerns.

"Consumers may be hesitant, but in B2B, where we are very focused on the corporate side, the necessary security, the rapid deployment of solutions... the take up is very quick," said Callahan.

He claimed Moore's Law was "running faster than ever" with his industry and innovation was happening at every turn, but financial institutions still needed to drill down and address users' concerns to move forward.

"We are beyond the beginning [of this technology] and perhaps this could be the year [of mobile payments], but I am not sure," added Callahan.

"We need to find the friction points for our customers that are stopping [them adopting] and work them through."

Michael Abbott, chief executive (CEO) of ISIS - a mobile wallet offering produced by three of the US' leading mobile operators - claimed the world was taking part in a revolution towards mobile payments, but agreed with Callahan that certain areas needed to be addressed.

"[A user's] mobile wallet will be a treasure trove of personal information, but this is one wallet we don't want to be picked or the revolution will be over before it starts," he said. "Security must be [top of the agenda]."

However, Abbott didn't believe one company could do this alone.

"We will need a certain set of standards," he added, "but this will take a lot of collaborating from a number of organisations who currently spend a lot more time competing than cooperating."

But John Partridge, president of Visa, wanted to remind people what the end result of mass adoption of mobile payments could lead to.

"The work we will do will make it possible for people born within the next five years to never have a physical wallet," he said.

"They will store finances in virtual environments, they will shop online... some may rarely enter a physical store and this is something that wasn't imagined a few years ago."

The chief information officer (CIO) may think he or she has control of the IT department, but they are now having to adhere to the tech requests of marketeers, rather than dictating what can be done.

So claims Fernando Alvarez, vice president of mobility solutions at Capgemini. During his keynote presentation at this year's Mobile World Congress, he claimed the likes of the chief marketing officer (CMO) had more power over new IT deployments than the person running the department.

For many years the CIO was driving. Now the consumer is driving and the CIO either has to play or is out.

"It is funny that we are meant to be in a fully connected world and we are still dealing with some offline issues," he said.

"But, CMOs and chief innovation officers are having more of a say than CIOs today. The CMO doesn't care about the process, they just want to get the new app out there to show their new service."

"The CMO is saying that I need to run and the CIO is saying they need to validate," he added. "The race is on."

Alvarez claimed that rather than letting one or the other have full control, there needed to be a new, more collaborative.

"One of the biggest tasks we have is how to balance that going forward... The traditional way of doing business is moving to more openess," added Alvarez.

"How many of you have walked into board room and seen CEO with iPad or PlayBook? For many years the CIO was driving. Now the consumer is driving and the CIO either has to play or is out."

Regulators are asking for too much from telecoms companies, whilst contributing to their slowing revenues.

These were the remarks of Rene Obermann, chief executive of Deutsche Telekom, during a keynote speech at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

We have embarked on a long-term vision to look at the company through the eyes of the consumers and make them more of a focus.

The industry leader attacked regulators, such as the European Commission, for asking telecoms firms to invest more money into networks, even though orders they have voted through have damaged profits for the likes of Deutsche Telekom.

"Despite an enormous competitive market, revenues have still [shrunk]. We need high performance networks, therefore regulators should be supportive," claimed Obermann.

"[Instead] they still continue to take a fantastic amount of money out of the network industry, whilst at the same time forcing or desiring companies to put in investment into next generation networks."

The CEO claimed operators were paying "billions" for licenses from regulators and throwing a lot of cash into networks, but are losing money as well thanks to new rules around termination rates and roaming charges.

"So operators pay billions for licenses, but at the same time they lost billions on the direct pricing interventions of regulators," said Obermann. "I suspect [revenues] will come down further, that is reality."

Despite this very corporate-focused attitude, Obermann still claimed there had been a change in the telecoms industry, with a much stronger focus on customer service and satisfaction.

"In the past, customer friendliness for telcos meant the customer had to be friendly to us," he joked. "That is something we all are guilty of; we never really had the focus on customer needs."

"But, with our company at least, we have embarked on a long-term vision...to look at the company through the eyes of the consumers and make them more of a focus," he said.

Cisco today announced new small cell solutions and next-generation hotspots to help offices move their employees' mobile traffic onto the Wi-Fi network.

With signal issues indoors causing havoc with mobile devices, Cisco claims Wi-Fi can play "a strong role" in boosting capabilities.

Some 85 per cent of time on mobiles is spent inside, proving the drop in signal affects a lot of interactions with a device, Murali Nemani,senior director of service provider mobility marketing at Cisco, told IT Pro.

But she also said it's the habits of employees that increase the need to clear the mobile network and move it onto Wi-Fi.

"Workers are using their cellphone inside the office more than the landline," claimed Nemani. "We would really like to offload that onto the Wi-Fi network."

The small cell solutions can be installed in offices to specifically tackle the mobile issue and prevent users having to use up valuable 3G coverage. But with next-generation hotspots, the employee can continue that experience when they leave the office.

"Employees no longer live in one environment," said Nemani. "Whether at the airport, the coffee shop or on the way home, the issue is they have to look through 30 SSIDs and go through their whole security procedure every time."

By using the Cisco technology, devices can automatically recognise hotspots to use and deploy all of the security measures automatically. this means users can move from office to public space and securely connect to a VPN without manual processes taking up valuable time.

"It creates a seamless authentication and authorisation path," added Nemani. "when employees come to a hotspot, it directs them to a network with the right level of security and lets them carry on with their job."

Cisco cannot do this alone and needs providers to get on-board with the scheme. In the UK, it has the big name of BT backing the products and trialling them with Wi-Fi hotspots across London.

There is also a large mobile operator in the UK trialling the system to use it across its mobile internet network, allowing employees to leave the office Wi-Fi and continue to securely access their corporate systems over 3G or 4G. However, Cisco would not reveal the name of the firm.

The products were launched at this week's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

Mobile applications are a dominant force in both work and play, but the ongoing fight to decide whether native or web applications are superior is hindering advancement in the area altogether.

So claims Scott Jenson, creative director at application design company Frog, who believes we need to look past the technology of today and start thinking about what the future will bring.

"When we talk about the iPad and when the iPad 3 comes out... what do we talk about?" he asked the packed out keynote at this year's Mobile World Congress 2012. "We say it's faster, or it's got more pixels, wow... not really that exciting is it?"

"When we talk about the future we speed bump the past, we are always looking in the rear view mirror expecting the new launches to be based around the technology available now. But that can't be the way for mobile apps."

Jenson spoke of the battle between native and web, falling very much on the latter's side, but tried to hammer home the point the industry must to do more than squabble.

"We have all [been] excited by native and web, but there are more exciting things [in the future] and we are too busy fighting over here," he added.

The next step on the road for applications centres around the sensors on your phone, claimed Jenson, namely GPRS, Wi-Fi, BlueTooth and RFID. Instead of downloading a whole application or searching online, these sensors will interact with the objects around you, from a food product to a bus stop, giving you all the information you need instantly.

"Look, am I going to walk up to a poster and install the app to [access the extra info) on it?" he said. "No. I want to use it and lose it, so [developers] have to start with the attitude of [a user that is] not sure what [they] want."

This is different to the world of the past 50 years, claimed Jenson. Although devices have got smaller, faster and cheaper, the nature of applications has remained the same.

"Why do we think we have to keep working this way?" he said - with audible frustration.

The creative director concluded: "We want to see the future but we are being blinded by certain paradigms of the day. There is nothing wrong with this paradigm but, seriously, are we all going to be using iPhones in 30 years?"

"We need to stop getting [caught up] in today's paradigms [and] we need to start inventing the future."

Many mobile manufacturers have made their way into the workplace, thanks to the consumerisation of IT. However, there is still one brand IT professionals view as the most secure and that title is given to BlackBerry.

This was the claim made by Steve Levy, chief executive (CEO) of the enterprise mobile app platform company Verivo.

During an interview with IT Pro, he claimed many devices were used by employees thanks to the increasing trend of 'BYOD' or Bring Your Own Device.

"I believe the company can no longer control what device [their systems] will be put on," he said. "Employees used to be given their work device, now they bring it in."

However, Levy said those running the IT department would support just one device - the BlackBerry - if they had their way.

"If IT could [stipulate] what employees brought in it would be BlackBerry," he said. "It is the most secure solution. But those days of IT [making that decision] are gone."

Verivo's own platform works across Android, iPhone and BlackBerry devices, but questions still hover over the suitability of Apple's flagship product when building enterprise apps.

"Everybody is aware that Apple tends to exercise, shall we say, more control than others," said Levy.

"Users have to rely on their discretion with their apps [and data] so you just have to hope it is not at their whim."

Yet, he claims his goal is to offer the customer choice, so if they want to build an app for Apple devices, his company, which has just launched in the UK, will provide the platform.

More business users want to utilise video calls on their mobiles, but devices do not live up to the promises when it comes to ease of use or quality.

So claims Ralph de la Vega, chief executive (CEO) of mobile provider AT&T, who acknowledged its flaws during his keynote speech today at Mobile World Congress and called on the gathered industry experts to help make a difference.

My challenge to all of us in this room is to figure out how we can take rich communication services and take it to the next level.

"We have made it too difficult to do video calls," he claimed, "despite the increasing [desire] to do so."

The CEO then challenged the audience to make a enhance usability by next year's MWC.

"My challenge to all of us in this room is to figure out how we can take rich communication services and take it to the next level," he said.

"We have to make it simple, make it easy... and by the time we meet here next year... it will be as easy for customers to place video calls as it is to place voice calls today."

Of course, the improvements cannot be made without extra investment and he called on companies, as well as regulatory bodies, to get behind this and vote with their wallets as well as their feet.

"No innovation cycle in this industry is possible without investment and we need to have sustainable business models... with regulators supportive of this," added de la Vega.

"If we continue to invest in the ecosystem by fostering innovation... we have incredible opportunities... and in my view it has no limits."

The CEO concluded: "We must push for more spectrum, invest in networks for the future, support apps and make it effortless for customers."

Tablets with mobile web capabilities cost too much and risk alienating a big slice of the population.

So claims Brian Dunn, chief executive (CEO) of Best Buy, who said customers, along with the wider economy, were suffering as a result.

"There are challenges in helping more people gain access to the mobile internet." the CEO said during his keynote at this year's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

"Thirty years ago the digital divide was between those with a computer an those without, five years ago smartphones changed the dynamic between the technology have and have nots."

"But now there is usually a significant upcharge for a device that connects to the mobile internet, with tablets being a good example."

Dunn claimed in the US, the hike in price from a Wi-Fi only tablet to one with 3G averaged out at $130 (82), which he said was "just too expensive for many people."

"I think operators, OEMs and the industry should work together to figure this problem out," he said. "Until we do, these devices will remain out of reach for a significant group of people."

"Any upcharge for mobile internet... further widens this digital divide and [damages] economies by restricting the access to services that can help people, and businesses, get back on track."

Dunn also took a dig at the number of locked devices, only allowing users to access one operator, that were on the market.

"It hasn't created significant issues to date but we don't think it will work going forward," he said.

"More locked devices means more skews we have to carry.... driving prices for the consumer upward instead of downward. But, more importantly, these locked devices stopped consumers getting the best [service] in what they need."

However, as CEO of Best Buy, he wanted to make clear he wasn't making particular digs at particular partners, stressing her was merely calling for greater industry wide collaboration.

"My comments are not about extracting better terms from our partners... rather making a call for better alignment within our industry, for all the companies in the connectivity industry to put consumer needs in the centre."

Dunn concluded: "I firmly believe a world connected by tech holds the promise of better lives and futures... by working together we can deliver on that promise."

It's that time of year again... The mobile industry has descended on Barcelona for Mobile World Congress (MWC). Check this page to keep up to speed with the latest announcements.

News

Big businesses favour iOS apps

Nokia's Elop taunts Windows Phone competition

Does marketing have more power than the CIO?

Deutsche Telekom lays into regulators

Cisco unveils next-generation hotspots

Time to look to future of mobile apps

MWC 2012: Call to arms for mobile video

MWC 2012: Tablet surcharge for 3G 'widens digital divide'

MWC 2012: Vodafone teams with Visa for NFC payments

Industry giants unite to launch new web-based smartphone tech

Sony Xperia P offers 'mobile office'

Vodafone has partnered with Visa to bring NFC payments using mobile phones to the UK.

The company's chief executive (CEO), Vittorio Colao, revealed the move during a keynote speech at this year's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

Our partnership with Vodafone represents a huge stride forward for mobile payments.

"We want to build more strategic partnerships with companies [and will begin] with Visa for NFC devices," said Colao.

"We need to create standards to deliver these services [and] with effective cooperation for standards and supportive regulation we can push [NFC payments] forward."

The roll-out will begin in the new 2012 financial year in the UK, Germany, Spain, Turkey and The Netherlands, but Vodafone plans to push the service to more than 30 countries across five continents.

The solution will be Vodafone-branded, but based on Visa's pre-payment technology, enabling users to top up their phones with cash and use them for touch payments in shops set up to carry out transactions in that way.

Once established, the platform will then become open, allowing businesses to host their services with Vodafone's mobile wallet. The mobile giant confirmed in its press statement that it is " in discussions with a large number of service providers - including banks, retailers, transport and utility companies, event organisers, smartphone application developers and advertisers - to host a broad range of services within an innovative new Vodafone "virtual" mobile wallet."

Visa is a popular choice of payment for many consumers, with some 445 million such debit, credit and commercial cards in operation in Europe. Of the overall consumer spending carried out in Europe each year, some 14 per cent is done via Visa, with 80 per cent of that coming from Visa debit cards, according to official statistics.

"Our partnership with Vodafone represents a huge stride forward for mobile payments," added Peter Ayliffe, CEO of Visa Europe. "Visa's future of payments initiative is more than just a promise: these services are real, tangible and coming to the mainstream consumer market in the very near future."

"Any Visa Issuer across these key markets will be able to work with Visa and Vodafone to enable mobile payments for their customers, backed by all the security, trust and global acceptance the Visa brand represents."

Sony Ericsson has unveiled its latest Xperia smartphones, claiming one would give style and substance to the business user.

The firm's press conference at Mobile World Congress (MWC) was the first Sony had made under the name Sony Mobile Communications since its acquisition of Sony Ericsson, which only completed 10 days ago.

When you put it into a smartdock, you don't just charge it, you turn it into a media centre or even a home office

The new Xperia S - the first in the Xperia NXT range which launched at CES in January - starts shipping this week at the same time as the consumer-focused Xperia U handset. However, it was the third announcement that caught the attention of IT Pro.

The Xperia P is made with an aluminium unibody and a four-inch reality display featuring Sony's White Magic display technology, which it claims cuts down on reflections from natural light.

It has an eight mega pixel camera and full HD video recording, but it is when the Xperia P is placed into a dock, it really takes the shape of a fully fledged business device.

"When you put it into a smartdock, you don't just charge it, you turn it into a media centre or even a home office," said Steve Walker, chief marketing officer (CMO) of Sony Mobile Communications.

"You can hook it up to your TV and navigate through it with a TV remote... but if you connect a wireless keyboard and mouse, you can then have full PC capability."

Other features of the Xperia P include a 1GHz dual-core processor, 16GB flash storage, HDMI outputs and built-in NFC technologies for Sony's SmartTag devices.

Focusing on its business portfolio is one of the key drivers for Sony this year, according to its new executive deputy president Kazuo Hirai.

"Throughout our 10-year joint venture with Ericsson, we have acquired a plethora of skills and know how," he said. "This kind of cross pollination... presents opportunities across smartphones and consumer electronics [and] in doing so, we will revitalise our product portfolio."

"I will spare no effort to ensure the success of this endeavour."

The Xperia P is set to launch in the middle of the second quarter this year, running Android 2.3. However, an upgrade to Android 4.0 will be available later in he same quarter.

The HTC Flyer tablet will cost 599.99 when pre-ordered at Carphone Warehouse, the store has announced on its website.

Although the exact date for the launch of the HTC Flyer is still unknown, the phone store started taking pre-orders for the iPad rival today.

The HTC Flyer was presented at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in February, yet there has been speculation about possible delays of the launch.

The setting of the official price for the Flyer tablet may go far to quash any fears around such delays and the planned second quarter launch should be met.

HTC's tablet, with its seven-inch display and 1.5Ghz processor, is destined to compete against the iPad 2 and a host of other tablets making their way to market this year.

It will also come with HTC Scribe Technology and an accompanying stylus for note taking, as well as 32GB of internal storage and Wi-Fi/3G capabilities.

The Flyer measures in at seven inches, compared to the iPad 2's 9.7-inch length.

Some may be shocked by the pricing, given the lowest cost iPad is 200 cheaper, but this is the 3G and Wi-Fi version of the device. A Wi-Fi only model is expected later this year at a lower price.

Check our first-look review to see if HTC's tablet stands a chance to threaten the iPad's supremacy.

This month, the great and the good of the mobile industry met in Barcelona for the annual Mobile World Congress (MWC) trade fair.

There, vendors showed off their latest mobile applications and devices, including smartphones and tablets. At the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas earlier this year, manufacturers announced more than 80 new tablets running the Android operating system alone. A plethora of tablet and smartphone announcements at MWC has added to the ranks.

For businesses and for IT departments in particular this proliferation of devices presents both an opportunity and a challenge. Chief executives generally agree that staff who have mobile devices are more productive, and there is plenty of research to back up that claim.

IT management tools vendor LogMeIn recently surveyed small and mid-sized businesses and found that 63 per cent of (non IT) managers believed that giving staff remote access to work IT did boost productivity.

It is also fair to assume that staff who can choose their devices will be more content than those forced to carry a company issued smartphone or tablet.

But managing a growing number, and range, of mobile devices causes problems for IT departments who often lack the expertise, and budgets, to ensure that portable IT equipment is accounted for and is secure.

The trend for employees to use their own devices at work is doing little to help matters. Often, as Cisco's security chief said recently, the most senior managers and executives are the worst culprits, demanding that IT connect their latest toys to the company's networks.

Your pad, or mine?

Short of setting up full-body scanners in the lobby and selecting any executive returning from Barcelona for an additional pat down, there is little that IT directors can do to stop the consumerisation trend. The devices are simply too attractive, and too useful.

A research report carried out by analyst firm Ovum and security body EEMA, found that seven out of 10 organisations allowed staff to use their smartphones for work. But almost half of organisations 48 per cent - said they also allowed employees to use personal devices at work.

Separate research, carried out by mobile connectivity vendor iPass, found a more worrying statistic: almost one in four employees had used a personal smart phone for work, even when company policy forbade it.

The ability of companies to control the use of personal mobile devices for business remains limited.

"The contract for the use of a personal device should require that the owner of the device cedes some level of control to their employer, so that business use can at least be ring fenced," says Peter Wood, of the information security advisory organisation ISACA.

"But it is a very difficult area."

Companies have two main options for dealing with non-business devices.

The first is to bolster perimeter security, so that unknown devices cannot connect to it. This can cause practical problems, such as slowing down the rollout of new company devices, or making it harder for visitors and contractors to go online.

What's more, it is fairly easy to circumvent, for example by installing an unauthorised wireless access point, unless the business also has strong network management tools. But good device access controls are part of good security, so it may well be worth the investment.

The second tool is to raise awareness of security risks, and to set clear policies around the use of personal technology by staff. IT should set the technical requirements for the policy, but will also need to consult HR and the legal department or in smaller companies, an employment law solicitor to make sure that the policy is both legal and enforceable.

"Employees' consent could be seen as a quid pro quo for being allowed to use their own devices. But it goes without saying that the terms and conditions would need to be very clear," says Ed Moody, applications manager at IT consultant and integrator BT Engage IT.

Holding the line

Sometimes, however, it might seem simpler and perhaps even cheaper in the long run for companies to issue their own devices. IT departments can integrate company owned devices into their infrastructure, install, or remove, software, and impose other limits, such as blocking access to particular websites or types of content.

Working with network operators can also make it easier to control mobile bills, by imposing limits on talk time, data transfers, or roaming. The tools for businesses to control usage are more sophisticated than those available for consumers, and remove the need for employees to reclaim business use of airtime via their expense reports.

Although the number of mobile device management tools available is growing, the market remains fragmented. With the possible exception of RIM's BlackBerry system, which allows very granular control over its smartphones through the BlackBerry Enterprise Server, managing even a few dozen mobile devices can pose a challenge.

At the UK arm of Volkswagen Financial Services, for example, field representatives who audit trade finance to car dealers are issued with BlackBerry smartphones.

The company looked at other smartphones but opted for BlackBerry because it complied with the German parent company's policies, according to Jean Smith, Volkswagen Financial Service' risk and corporate services director.

Modifications to the standard BlackBerry include disabling the ability to download apps, turning off BlackBerry Messenger, and forcing the device to wipe itself after five failed attempts to enter the password.

"There are quite a few restrictions," Smith admits.

Elsewhere, the uptake of mobile device management tools has been more limited. Apple supports remote wiping and locking of iPhones via iTunes and Mobile Me, and recently made the service free.

Microsoft's System Centre Mobile Device Manager was a popular option for companies running Windows Mobile, but the technology does not support Windows Phone 7, forcing businesses to manage these devices through Exchange ActiveSync, or using third-party tools.

The market for management tools for Android also remains immature.

This is forcing companies to take a DIY approach to device management, according to Rob Bamforth, analyst at research firm Quocirca.

Businesses are mixing security tools, third-party mobile management tools, and services from network operators. However, operator-based tools are becoming more sophisticated and could give organisations a simpler way to manage their smartphones assuming they are all from one carrier.

Laptops are now pretty well secured but smartphones are lagging, especially with security," cautions Bamforth. "The problem is mainly one of platform diversity, and it shows no signs of diminishing," he said. "That some tablet platforms are scaled up from smartphones, and not down from laptops as was once assumed, means they are more likely to be managed and deployed in a similar fashion to phones."

But, he adds, it is policies and devices, rather than tools, that will ensure mobile workers stay secure.

EU citizens are being ripped off when it comes to roaming charges and the system needs to be fairer, according to a senior member of the European Commission.

Speaking at Mobile World Congress 2011, Neelie Kroes, vice president of the European Commission responsible for the Digital Agenda, said the cost of using a mobile abroad was simply too high.

She was talking after a European Commission survey showed nearly three-quarters of Europeans were worried about the cost of using their mobiles when traveling across the EU. The majority of respondents said they limited their roaming calls because of high charges.

Kroes explained how voice roaming prices within Europe are over three times the level of domestic charges, whilst the data roaming situation is "even grimmer."

"The consumer often pays less than five cents for downloading a MB of data at home, but this may turn into 2.60 per MB when the same consumer crosses an invisible border," she told delegates in Barcelona.

"I would love to be able to say to you today that the roaming market is competitive; that data roaming charges approach domestic prices; that bill shocks are a thing of the past; that prices for voice and SMS roaming are not clustered around the maximum levels permitted. Regrettably I cannot."

She admitted data roaming charges had fallen significantly, but this was not being matched in lower retail prices.

"Incentives to compete on roaming prices are not as strong as the pressures on domestic prices. But that is not a justification for the current rip-offs," Kroes said.

The Digital Agenda has set a goal of cutting the difference between roaming and national prices to close to zero by 2015. Currently, the EU employs a capping policy to regulate how much providers can charge.

"It may be that no single approach will do the job on its own," she added.

"While I doubt that time may in itself solve our problems, it seems difficult to think that we can maintain price regulation forever."

All phones, all the time

Mobile World Congress hit Barcelona this week, bringing with it a tsunami of mobile news - click here for our roundup of the week.

Loads of hot new handsets were released, including the Samsung Wave, Sony Ericsson Vivaz Pro and a trio from HTC. And don't miss our videos of the [a href="https://www.itpro.com/620509/mwc-2010-toshiba-tg02-hands-on-video" target="_blank" ]Toshiba TG02 and the Sony Ericsson X10 Mini Pro.

Microsoft also unveiled its Windows Phone 7 series, Intel and Nokia teamed up for MeeGo, and a host of mobile leaders joined forces to take on Apple's App Store.

Shell breached

Shell admitted this week its data security was breached, with activists being sent a copy of the massive oil firm's employee list.

The breach may have been an insider job, with the list sent out with instructions on how to use it to contact employees to get them to improve the way the company operates.

Office 2010 pricing

Microsoft unveiled the pricing for Office 2010, and it should come as no surprise that the UK is again paying more than the US.

Outlook 2010 will also be very social, with LinkedIn, Facebook and MySpace integrated into the email client.

The best of the rest...

It was a busy week for Google, with its ebooks hearing kicking off, a massive $2 million donation to Wikipedia's parent company, and a formal complaint about Buzz - while the EU approved the search deal between Microsoft and Yahoo.

A new botnet has been discovered, which has already hit 75,000 computers.

Adobe patched a few flaws, banks defended the chip and PIN system, and Apple was accused of some pretty nasty tricks to keep suppliers quiet.

Barcelona this week played home to Mobile World Congress (MWC), the biggest event in the mobile industry's calendar.

The four-day event was a whirlwind of announcements, keynote speeches, demonstrations and launches, as well as a great networking opportunity for vendors and decision makers alike.

To separate the really interesting technologies from all the noise, we run down our top 10 technologies, products and services from the main event.

1)Eye-controlled headphones

This innovation even had Stephen Fry excited. And that's no mean feat. Hidden away on the DoCoMo stand, the headphones sound a bit like something you'd find in a science fiction film. But they're actually here now and wowed the crowds at MWC.

This innovation makes use of your eyes, rather than your digits or speech, to control media player functionality. Looking left or right, for example, will instruct the player to fast forward or rewind the track you're listening to. We like the idea but think the reality will take a bit of getting used to. And it could prove problematic if you get something in your eye while listening

2)Phones for all budgets

Vodafone announced plans to launch two cheap handsets to boost mobile access in developing countries. The company's 150 and 250 low-cost devices will be made available for just $15 and $20 respectively in eight countries in Africa, in addition to India and Turkey.

While users in the developed world may sniff at what the no-frills handsets offer voice and texts, with the 250 also boasting a colour screen and FM radio in developing countries mobile phones are key to everyday life, especially as the related infrastructure in some countries is more advanced that the fixed line infrastructure.

3)Android action

It was highly unlikely that MWC would come and go for another year without anyone mentioning Android. Google's chief executive Eric Schmidt took to the stage for his keynote to talk about how the mobile OS is still very popular, with 60,000 handsets running the platform being shipped each day.

HTC also showed it still loves Android by showcasing the Desire, which is widely being touted as the next Nexus One. It'll be hitting the UK in just a few months.

4)Windows Phone 7 Series

Steve Ballmer even flew to Barcelona to deliver the good news himself. As we all suspected, Windows Mobile has been given a big makeover and will now return -reinvented and much improved later this year on a range of handsets and networks.

Dubbed Windows Phone 7 Series, the new launch will no doubt be backed by a big-money marketing and advertising campaign to spread the message to business users and consumers alike. If you've used Windows Mobile before and had a bad experience, it's likely this may just be enough to change your mind. Of course, only time will tell whether the tweaks will be enough to have the rest of the mobile world shaking in their boots or not.

5)Getting tough

While we all love our phones, most of us have a love/hate relationship with them, throwing them when we're angry, putting them in the same pocket/bag as our keys and just generally not treating them as well as we should and could.

And, while it's highly unlikely that the average business user will find

themselves running over their handset with a car on a regular basis, it's good to know some phones are up to the challenge nonetheless.

Sonim's XP2 Spirit is made out of tough stuff, with Gortex, hardened rubber, nylon and fibreglass and a magnesium core ensuring it is both waterproof and able to shrug off the harshest of treatment without issue. Gorilla glass also means the Spirit and your keys can remain friends rather than foes.

But it's not all just meaty packaging. The handset also boasts a three megapixel camera, suite of Java apps, a multimedia player, support for IMAP4 and POP3 email, web browsing and more.

"We've watched our customers closely and have seen how they struggle when they don't have a Sonim phone in-hand. We strive to deliver the strongest phones that can withstand the noise of a jackhammer, a rocky mountain face, splashing water or intense wind and rain," said Bob Plaschke, Sonim's chief executive, in a statement.

"The Spirit continues Sonim's tradition of marrying technology and toughness and now introduces 3G to deliver the best rugged mobile phone on the market. The Spirit will be available in stores across Europe next month."

Israeli firm Else claims it's trying to do something revolutionary when it comes to mobile phones, essentially ripping up traditional design and starting again.

The tech behind the phone is open source Access Linux with a custom-made interface overlaid that puts the user's thumb at the centre of the action.

There's no word on how much it'll cost users or when exactly it will launch as that will be in the hands of the operators.

7)Small but perfectly formed?

Good things that come in small packages were the order of the show at this year's MWC. HTC unveiled the HD Mini, while Sony Ericsson took the wraps of its own shrunken down tech in the form of the Xperia X10 Mini and Mini Pro.

While the size of these devices may mean they're not ideal for 24/7 use, the manufacturers have packed a great deal into the form factor so we think they definitely have a promising future.

8)Something for BlackBerry fans

RIM excited users with two big announcements at MWC. A browser upgrade will please those who've not been that happy with what the current version has to offer. There was also more good news to come for smaller businesses, with the company's chief executive Mike Lazaridis using his keynote speech to confirm that a free, Express version of the BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) would be made available to them.

"In a marketplace where smartphones are becoming ubiquitous, BlackBerry Enterprise Server Express significantly raises the bar by providing a cost-effective solution that allows companies of all sizes to support enterprise-grade mobile connectivity for all employees without compromising security or manageability," he said in an accompanying statement.

9)Solar-powered phone

When people think of Puma, they rightly associate the company with sports gear, but that's changing as it makes a move into the mobile space.

Using Sagem hardware, Puma's mobile has a sporty flavour and therefore comes with the sort of tools you'd expect, such as a pedometer. Round the back of the handset which will be available in the second quarter of the year you'll find a solar panel. Let's just hope it's sunny while you're jogging around the park.

"The PUMA Phone will be a milestone in the mobile market as the first mobile device completely tailor designed, from the inside out, with technology and services that improve experience and connect a brand community " Sagem's chief executive Thierry Buffenoir, said in a statement back in October last year when the phone was first announced.

10)Education for all nations

It's one thing to recognise that the mobile industry is a powerful force and another to try and use that power for good. But that's exactly what happened at MWC as Her Majesty, Queen Rania Al Abdullah of Jordan used the event to launch a mission to ensure every child around the world can go to school by 2015.

The 1GOAL: Education for All mobile campaign which unites operators, FIFA, football stars, charities and others - will try to address the fact that more than 70 million of the world's children don't get the chance to receive even the most basic of primary school-level teaching.

"1GOAL is about people-power the largest ever, never-before-done, cause-related campaign of its kind," Her Majesty said in a statement. "And I hope that those of you in the mobile ecosystem who haven't done so, will join up and sign up before our kick-off in April."

Today marks the last day of Mobile World Congress (MWC). The main news has already been announced, the keynotes already delivered and the products already showcased.

So, as the exhibitors start packing up their stands and the delegates start heading for home with their heads buzzing from all the mobile information they've tried to absorb this week, we take a quick look at the show that was in picture form.

Click on the gallery above to see photo highlights from the event. And click here for our roundup of all the news from Mobile World Congress 2010.

Facebook has unveiled Zero, another cut-down version of its site for mobile users.

Facebook already offers a version of its social networking site for mobile devices - at m.facebook.com - as well as apps for use on iPhones and other handsets.

Last year, it launched Facebook Lite, for use in emerging markets with less robust internet connections, although it has arrived in the UK.

Now, there's also Facebook Zero, which is a text-based version of the site for use with mobile phones, unveiled at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this week.

A spokeswoman for Facebook told IT PRO: "Zero is a light-weight version of m.facebook.com that omits data intensive applications like Photos."

"It will launch in coming weeks and we are discussing it at MWC as an option to make Facebook on the mobile web available to everyone, anywhere and allow operators to encourage more mobile internet usage," she added.

Zero is expected to launch in the next few weeks.

Facebook has so far had a lot of success in the mobile world, with 100 million people accessing the site on the go.

Mobiles are front of the queue when it comes to Google engineers' time, according to the web giant's chief executive who took to the stage at Mobile World Congress (MWC) today in Barcelona.

Indeed, when the company's collective brain is coming up with and testing new products, how they fit into the mobile devices picture is front of mind with developers keen to see how their work will translate to the form factor, Eric Schmidt told delegates.

"Mobile first" is the company's new guiding principle, he said.

The fact that today's youth refer to their mobiles simply as phones rather than with a mobile prefix, is testament to just how far the industry has come and how successful it is, according to Schmidt.

Google is no stranger to the power of mobile devices. Schmidt said that most of the new web connections the industry is experiencing now come from the portable world. And, he added, that Google is now shipping 60,000 new Android-based devices each and every day.

During his keynote speech at MWC, Schmidt and his team demonstrated Flash running on Android as well as showcasing Google's voice translation talents and firming up details of Google Goggles.

See the video below for more on what Google Goggles can offer business users and consumers alike.

HTC today unveiled what is widely being referred to as the Nexus Two, in the form of the HTC Desire as well as another Android stablemate dubbed the HTC Legend.

Both will feature HTC's Sense interface and run the latest version of the Android operating system. T-Mobile has already confirmed that the Desire will be available on its network from 26 March. Orange followed suit and said the device will be heading its way from April.

A lavish 3.7in AMOLED WVGA display sits centre stage on the Desire and a 1GHz Snapdragon processor lives inside to power things along.

With a 3.2in, AMOLED HVGA screen, the Legend is made out of a single aluminium block. As with the Desire, the trackball has gone and an optical joystick now takes its place.

HTC's Sense UI has also been tweaked and boasts an enhanced browser and email support. It also includes a new Friend Stream widget that brings together different social networking feeds.

Against the backdrop of a gloomy economy, HTC's chief executive Peter Chou admitted that the past year has not been a good one for the mobile phone industry. However, he said HTC had used this period to its advantage to help strengthen its brand.

The new devices blend together sophisticated design and software, rather than just one or the other - something Chou referred to as "beauty with soul."

"At its essence, the mobile phone is the most personal item you have in your possession. HTC Sense was created to magnify your ability to create and define your own unique mobile experience," Chou added in a statement.

"HTC Legend and HTC Desire take Android to another level in both substance with HTC Sense and style with HTC Legend's revolutionary crafted aluminum uni-body design."

HTC also took the wraps of a compact version of its popular HD2 handset in the form of the HD Mini.

Samsung is continuing to show off what it can do at Mobile World Congress (MWC) by demonstrating the first netbook powered by Long Term Evolution (LTE) technology alongside its newly unveiled handsets such as the Wave.

Experts have demoed a Samsung N150 - which users can also get with Wi-Fi and 3G - fired up by Samsung's own LTE modem chipset dubbed Kalmia to showcase the reliability and speed of live video streaming.

"The N150 is the smart choice to meet all your essential mobile computing needs with style," said Kyu Uhm, Vice president of Samsung's IT solutions business, in a statement.

"We see increasing demand for data services, regardless of whether the consumer is indoors, outside, or even on the move. With our end-to-end Total Solution from core chipset to a variety of devices, we are providing true value to our customers."

Check back on the site later for IT PRO's take on what this technology has to offer business users.

Microsoft's chief executive Steve Ballmer made the journey to Barcelona to wax lyrical about his company's latest mobile operating system Windows Phone 7.

The desire to see the man on stage was so great that many journalists invited to the press event were kept in an overflow area and forced to listen to his speech via live webcast feed instead of from the same conference hall.

Ballmer showcased the innovative and user friendly features that Windows Phone 7 will bring to fruition when it arrives on handsets later this year. Orange and HTC have already confirmed their device lineups.

"Today, I'm proud to introduce Windows Phone 7 Series, the next generation of Windows Phones," Ballmer said in a statement. "In a crowded market filled with phones that look the same and do the same things, I challenged the team to deliver a different kind of mobile experience. Windows Phone 7 Series marks a turning point toward phones that truly reflect the speed of people's lives and their need to connect to other people and all kinds of seamless experiences."

The new Start screen is a key point of interest with the new OS, with so-called live tiles being updated dynamically to deliver what matters to users most in real time. There's also a dedicated Bing-focused hardware button to aid users' web searches, according to Microsoft.

Different users' needs and requirements are also catered for through a series of what Microsoft calls hubs:

The People hub is focused on friends, contacts and interaction, bringing together key tools such as Windows Live and Facebook.

The Pictures hub is all about sharing the memories captured by photographs and videos quickly and easily.

The Games hub brings Microsoft's Xbox LIVE experience to users' phones.

The Music and Video hub blends the experience of Zune with radio and other multimedia facets to enable both the user and those with shared interests to enjoy the entertainment experience, according to Microsoft.

The Marketplace hub, as you'd expect, puts applications and games at users' fingertips.

The Office hub does what it says on the tin and delivers familiar applications to the palm of a user's hand.

The video below showcases what went on during Steve Ballmer's visit to MWC.

A 27-strong team of mobile firms is teaming up to take on Apple's App store.

Mobile application stores have taken off over the past few years, lead by Apple's own App Store.

While Google's Android Market and other mobile app shopfronts have popped up, Apple has dominated the space with billions of downloads.

Now, the market is hotting up, with a group of 24 mobile operators and three manufacturers teaming up to create their own monster application ecosystem.

At the moment, the Wholesale Applications Community is in the development phase, working on a set of standards to be released over the next year.

It's also looking for more industry members to join its team, which includes the likes of Sony Ericsson, LG and Samsung, as well as Orange and Vodafone. With its existing membership, it already has access to more than three billion customers.

The community is looking to streamline the creation of apps by letting developers focus on one system. However, with Apple's big market and shops run by major players like Nokia and BlackBerry, it's hard to believe developers won't have to make multiple versions of their apps.

The Wholesale Applications Community does have the support of the GSMA - the body that organises Mobile World Congress, where the announcement was made.

Rob Conway, chief executive of the GSMA, said in a statement: "This approach is completely in line with the principles of the GSMA, and in fact leverages the work we have already undertaken on open network APIs (OneAPI)."

"This is tremendously exciting news for our industry and will serve to catalyse the development of a range of innovative cross-device, cross-operator applications," he added.

Read on for more news from Mobile World Congress 2010.

Orange is set to push its high-definition mobile voice service across Europe this year, the operator announced at Mobile World Congress today in Barcelona.

After unveiling its first HD voice services in Moldova last September, Orange now plans to launch the HD service in France, Luxembourg, and Spain this year. The UK will see the service in a three-month trial set to start this spring.

Orange said HD voice will offer the "best possible sound quality", especially in a noisy area, "creating a much closer feeling of proximity between both parties, almost as if callers are actually in the same room."

The system uses a special codec that boosts quality using existing networks by using speech bandwidth of 50 to 7,000 Hz compared to standard systems using 300 to 3,400 Hz, Orange claimed.

Olaf Swantee, senior executive vice president for Orange's global mobile business, said: "As far as Orange is concerned, voice is not just a commodity. With mobile HD voice, we are delivering true customer innovation - one that will genuinely enrich and transform our customers' lives."

"By being the first to innovate and deliver a new mobile voice experience, we provide a compelling and differentiated proposition which sets Orange apart," he added in a statement.

Handsets and prices will be announced when the service arrives in the UK, Orange said.

New tariffs

Orange also used MWC to unveil some new roaming data tariffs, which should please both business users and consumers alike who find themselves traveling for work and/or play.

The "2 for 2Mb" opt-in tariff lets users keep in touch via their data services while travelling anywhere in the European Union.

There will also be a "10 for 10Mb" tariff for smartphone users, Orange said.

Orange users travelling to the continent will be able to opt-in to the service from this month.

Read on for more news from Mobile World Congress 2010.

Intel and Nokia today announced a new Linux-focused collaboration to develop the software of the future for mobile devices.

Dubbed MeeGo, the two computing giants claimed the open system will result in enhanced user experiences and an ability to port apps from one device to another quickly and easily.

MeeGo will be hosted by the Linux Foundation, with the first iteration expected to arrive in the second quarter of this year. Software created as a result of the project - making use of the Qt development environment - will span mobile phones, netbooks, tablets and more.

"It's hard not to be impressed with the speed of change in our industry," said Kai istm, who heads up Nokia's devices unit. "Users will be able to keep their favourite apps whenever they change devices. MeeGo is an open system. A new frontier with no walls and no fences."

And it's not just good news for users, either.

"[This will offer] equal opportunities for all manufacturers," istm added. "It will co-exist with Symbian and they will complement one another."

Intel is equally as enthused by what the future holds for this open collaboration.

"Our vision for seamlessly communicating between computing devices from the home, auto, office or your pocket is taking a big step forward today with the introduction of MeeGo," Intel president and chief executive Paul Otellini said in a statement.

"This is a foundational step in our evolving relationship with Nokia. The merging of these two important assets into an open source platform is critical toward providing a terrific experience across a variety of devices and gaining cross- industry support."

Vodafone has announced a pair of ultra low-cost handsets designed to bring mobile technology to entry-level users in emerging markets for the first time.

The Vodafone 150 and 250 are to retail unsubsidised at "below" $15 and $20 respectively. They will be offered initially in India, Turkey and eight African countries The Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Mozambique, Qatar, South Africa and Tanzania.

Both handsets will share basic voice and SMS services, with the 250's extra cost accounted for by its larger colour screen and FM radio.

Both will also feature support for mobile payment services. Vodafone says more than 11 million of its customers now use their mobile phones for money transfers and bill payments, and clearly now feels it is an essential feature on even the most basic of mobile phones.

"The cost of mobile handsets can be one of the most significant barriers for people in accessing and benefiting from the growing number of socially valuable mobile services," said Patrick Chomet, Vodafone's group director of terminals.

In designing the two handsets, Vodafone worked with Chinese device manufacturer TCL to deliver a basic level of user experience, safety and quality at an affordable cost. However, it says that is only the start, and plans to support the launch of the phones with an extensive logistics infrastructure designed specifically for areas where mobile penetration has traditionally been low.

In India, for example, Vodafone expects its new devices to be available to an unprecedented 60 per cent of the population.

"The lives of people who use these phones the Vodafone 150 and Vodafone 250 will be changed and improved as they become part of the mobile society. I am proud of the work we have done and will continue to do in this critical area of customer empowerment," Chomet added.

The Vodafone 150 features a 1in monochrome 96x64-pixel display, a mini-USB data connector, polyphonic ringtones, talk time of up to five hours and standby battery life of 400 hours. The 250 adds a 128x128-pixel 1.45in colour screen and an FM radio.

Both handsets also include basic features such as vibration, a torch, alarm clock, calculator, currency converter, SMS storage and phone book memory of up to 100 entries.

Read on for more news from Mobile World Congress 2010.

Toshiba has used the first day of Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona to unveil the successor to its slim line Windows Mobile-powered TG01 handset.

The TG02 will also run the latest version of Windows Mobile and features a 4.1in VGA capacitive touch screen. There's also a new 3D-based menu system to ensure users can get to the entertainment features they prefer quickly and easily and, like its predecessor, it's primed for video on the move, according to Toshiba.

Toshiba's announcement also surprised with news of the K01 handset. It'll boast the same lavishly sized screen (4.1in) as the TG02 but will be a first for the company as it's an Organic Light Emitting Diode (OLED) capacitive display. And, while the TG02 is keyboard-free, the K01 will feature a slide-out QWERTY.

Designed with messaging in mind, according to Toshiba, the K01 comes with a new interface and 1GHz processor for ease of browsing.

As yet, Toshiba hasn't confirmed when these two new handsets will be available.

Read on for more news from Mobile World Congress 2010.

Sony Ericsson has followed up last month's launch of the HD-focused Vivaz handset by unveiling the Vivaz Pro.

The younger sibling, which will be available in the coming months in either black or white, boasts a 3.2in (16:9 wide screen) touch screen and a full, slide-out QWERTY keyboard to ensure both messaging and multimedia cravings are satisfied.

"Having announced Sony Ericsson Vivaz in January we are now adding a sister phone that includes a QWERTY keyboard along with the touch screen for a superior messaging and entertainment experience," said Daniel Sandblom, Sony Ericsson's marketing business manager, in a statement ahead of the first day of Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona.

"Sony Ericsson Vivaz Pro meets the increased consumer demand for QWERTY devices without compromising on any entertainment features."

The new handset features a slick design, which is based on Sony's human curvature' philosophy.

Read on for more news from Mobile World Congress 2010.