The Mobile World Congress starts in just a week’s time. This year the fair will see the appearance of foldable smartphones, the first true innovation since cellphones became intelligent (in 2010). Over the last few years, the most important mobile device fair in the world has seen bendable screens, but we should finally see them used on devices which will soon be available on the market.
One brand which stands out is Samsung, which already gave us a taste of the future in November with a smartphone that opens like a book and which has an auxiliary external 4.7-inch screen, plus one inside that opens like two pages in a book and reaches a size of 7.3 inches. Hot on its heels is Huawei. A presentation is expected for 24 March of which little is known but for which the image is clear, showing an extremely thin device folded into a V. As Richard Yu announced, it is a flexible phone and there will be a dedicated event in March for the new P30.
Nubia also bends without breaking, but its has decided to apply the flexible screen to a smartwatch. Known for now as Alpha, the smartwatch has an OLED panel which wraps around the wrist allowing for the handling of more information than a classic smartwatch. There may be something similar proposed by TCL, the Chinese company behind Alcatel and Blackberry smartphones. There should also be something similar from Oppo but we still know very little and the release is likely to be postponed.
The second innovation attracting attention is 5G. The ultrafast network which reduces latency to zero is making waves among the telephone companies, and as a consequence, manufacturers are also ready to create devices capable of exploiting it. Here we have One Plus boasting that it will be presenting an almost definitive prototype which should anticipate its model 7 due at the end of May. There is also the omnipresent Samsung. The queen of the smartphones wants to be the first in this sector as well and cannot afford to be seen backing out. There is even talk of a Galaxy S10 created for 5G but these are still unconfirmed rumours.
Staying with the Koreans, LG should be unveiling the V50 ThinQ, a smartphone which is already ready for the market and compatible with 5G. There is also a steam-chamber cooling system which should keep a check on components overheating due to the ultra-fast network. ZTE, a Chinese brand, should be launching its 5G smartphone, which will probably be called the Axon 10 Pro, but this is still unclear.
Let’s come back down to earth to see what the market has in store for us in the short-term. We have Samsung with its new standard-bearer, the Galaxy S10, which will be presented in three models. The Koreans have decided to present them before the fair, on 20 February, but they will also be showing at the Mobile World Congress. Nokia is also causing a stir with its 9, an Android device which is focusing everything on photography, offering as many as five rear cameras.
There also is extreme photography with the Sony Xperia XZ4. The Japanese are among the best producers of photographic sensors, and this telephone combines the 6.5-inch screen with a 48-megapixel sensor. The same sensor can be found on the Xiami Mi 9, a top-of-the-range 6.4-inch unit with a small drop-shaped notch in the upper part of the screen.
Beyond smartphones, Microsoft may make the biggest impression by bringing to the fair the HoloLens2, the new version of its glasses for mixed reality (in other words augmented and virtual), created above all for business applications. There is also space dedicated to the automotive industry: Seat will be playing at home in Barcelona, and among the products on display we will see prototype 5G connected cars and an electric vehicle for micro-mobility which will be presented as an evolution of the scooter.
Among the more curious items, it would be impossible not to mention Energizer. The battery manufacturer has decided to offer consumers the Power Max P18K Pop, a smartphone with a maxi-battery of 18-thousand mAh, approximately four times more the power of its competitors, and it also boasts a dual pop-up front-facing camera which avoids the need for a notch. The same manufacturer is also presenting feature phones, or rather advanced cellular phones. There will be eight, and prices will begin from approximately 33 euros. In other words, spares to carry around for when the smartphone battery runs flat.