Mobile World Congress to unveil face of future communications

Facebook founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg is expected to detail more of his company's plans to bring underserved parts of the world online, when he addresses Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this evening.

Zuckerberg is set to share updates about Facebook’s Internet.org project at the event, which is one of the biggest technology conferences of the year.

Almost 90,000 people are expected to attend Mobile World Congress, which runs until Thursday. It will set the roadmap for the mobile industry in 2015. Fifth-generation mobile networks or 5G, will be high on the agenda this year, along with mobile payments, smart clothing, and virtual and augmented reality.

Products launched

Wanting to stay one step ahead of the game, HTC and

Samsung

unveiled new products, before the official kickoff of the event. HTC launched its new flagship smart phone, the One (M9); a virtual reality headset called Vive; and Grip, a GPS-enabled smart fitness tracker.

US Federal Communications Commission chairman Tom Wheeler, Intel chief executive Brian Krzanich, Ericisson chief executive Hans Vestberg, GSMA director general Anne Bouverot, Mozilla Foundation executive chairwoman Mitchell Baker and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales will be among the speakers at the tech conference.

Enterprise Ireland said 18 client companies will showcase communications technology solutions on the Ireland stand at the trade fair and conference.

The Irish companies in attendance include Anam Technologies, Cubic Telecom, Fishtree, Equiendo and Xintec.

Pat Byrne, manager of Enterprise Ireland’s software division, said Mobile World Congress will provide “the ideal networking opportunity” for the Irish entrepreneurs to meet directly with major global mobile network operators, ISPs, social media companies, app creators, and content partners”.

Key players

MMIX (Mobile Music Innovation eXperience) will be a brand-new series of events at this year’s Mobile World Congress, bringing together a host of industry-leading chief executives and ecosystem players from the music, entertainment and mobile industries.

The MMIX series of events begins today and will feature speakers such as Shazam chief executive Rich Riley, rapper and producer Will.i.am and Rhapsody chief executive David Hose.