We began the second day with a rather long visit at the booths. The great number of technologies on display can convey a feeling of surcharge.
The fascination or curiosity showed by attendees is many times turned into financial gain. This type of event is different than the classical IT conferences where technologies and ideas are presented only for the sake of users. Therefore, beyond the quaint technological mood, you start noticing that everyone is trying to sell you something. As journalist, you are many times overwhelmed by invitations.
After giving you an overview of the more general MWC mood, I think it is time to show you some of the products that caught our eye today. We saw the latest Samsung phones: Galaxy 10e, 10 and 10+, which boast impressive screen and material quality.
The same goes for the Huawei laptops and phones placed right on the other side.
We could notice incremental evolution not only in the case of the gadgets used, but also in the case of other technologies too: drones, cars, mobile networks, AR/VR, AI. I discussed with colleagues from Romania's booth and reached the conclusion that we cannot be fascinated or even shocked by a new field anymore because technology is improved on a yearly basis.
Technology is becoming better, more ecological, more economical and more integrated. Many times, the magic moves to the unseen side of software and not so much to hardware, as we were previously accustomed. As mentioned in the Day 1 article, there are many solutions, hence the commercial outreach mentioned before. We stopped at Romania's booth set up by ARIES Timișoara with the support of the Ministry of Business and Entrepreneurship. We talked to many of the people who represented us there, many of the discussions leading to interviews which we will publish.
After learning many new things, I decided to attend some presentations run by IBM: Reality of Digital Transformation: What Works & _Doesn't Work. The first presentation was delivered by Eric Berridge, CEO Bluewolf (IBM company) where I learned that we shouldn't focus on creating products, but rather experiences for our users. The example given there was that of buying a computer, a context where everything happens very fast: from choosing a computer, to purchasing and receiving it. Everything can be integrated with AR and we can already talk about a recipe for success. How will AI manage the process? It will offer us suggestions and opinions, so that we are better informed and we can choose better. In the end, I got some advice related to how companies operate: if the products we develop are not good enough for our customers, these will not be good for employees either.
Nils Huske, Head of Customer Experience, Strategy and Innovation la Volkswagen talked about the duration and high costs associated with a validation program through a focus group: costs reach up to 100.000 euro. The solution they found was creating and validating an MVP. The example they gave emphasizes the importance of failure: attracting football fans to use car sharing when attending a football game. Although there were many investments in Facebook commercials to promote the message and receive quiz feedback, the results were below expectations. It was easy to identify the root cause: football fans already use car sharing when attending football games by using WhatsApp. For this reason, it made no sense for them to install a new application. The solution was to adapt the car sharing application for going to work.
Gamifying The Mobile Experience was a discussion about how we can integrate gaming in our applications. An example comes from Outfit7, the ones who launched Talking Tom in 2010. Since then, they reached 9 billion downloads, and in 2020 they plan to produce a film too. Their model is to produce applications which run fast on telephones. Development is achieved in approximately 1-1.5 years and is tested (for the first time) in a country where it undergoes finishing touches. It is only then that applications are launched globally.
At the end of today's conference, one of the best things about MWC would be the mass-media area where access is reserved for press journalists and television. The mood here was really imbued by the passion for technology and the desire to inform. Writing this article from this particular area is one of the most pleasant experiences at this year's MWC edition.
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by Ovidiu Mățan
