MWC 2019: Tech of the near-future
06 March 2019
Every year, Mobile World Congress gives us the opportunity to check out awe-inspiring gadgets of the near-future. Here’s the most impressive stuff we saw in Barcelona in 2019.
Foldable smartphones
There’s been a huge buzz around foldable tech in recent months. Samsung and Huawei have been at the forefront of this, having announced summer releases for their fancy flexible devices
People seem a little more excited about the Huawei Mate X than the Samsung Galaxy Fold because the former opens outwards and has thinner bezels. They’re both beautiful in person though.
Now, about the prices. We expect them to retail between £1600 and £2100. Time to start saving those pennies...
Samsung Galaxy Fold
Huawei Mate X
5G everywhere
There was a huge focus on 5G tech at MWC19. We saw everything from 5G enabled smartphones, to driverless cars and pilot-free aerial taxis which navigate and interact using the high-speed network. Crazy!
You could say where we’re going, we don’t need roads. You could also say Robert Zemeckis sold us a lie about hoverboards and I haven’t forgiven him yet. People say a lot of things.
BMW 5G Driverless ‘iNEXT’ Concept car
Ooredoo-powered pilotless aerial taxi
Virtual reality gaming
The speed of data streaming required to run a seamless virtual reality game is startling. Nokia showed us the difference 5G can make with a comparison demo on a customised ping-pong table.
Robots with jobs
In the movies, robots usually seem to be a source of terror, dedicating every waking moment to hunting down soft, vulnerable humans. The ones at MWC19 seemed alright though.
We bumped into one little guy who was too busy delivering parcels to chat, and another who can, apparently, operate as a babysitter. Don’t fire Stacey from across the road yet though – humanoid robots won’t reach consumers until 2025 at the earliest. *Sad bleep-boop*.
Twinswheel Delivery Droid (left) and New Era ‘Babysitter’ Robot (right)
Phones with a billion cameras
We’ve seen a trend of escalation with phone-cameras over the last 18 months. One company adds an extra lens, another adds two. One adds 3D features, the next adds super-slow-mo. Etcetera, etcetera. Where will the madness end?
Not with Nokia. They’ve crammed five (yes, FIVE) rear-facing cameras into their new 9 PureView handset. And why not indeed? Less is more is an outdated concept. MORE IS MORE IN 2019.
Other big mobile announcements
Nokia weren’t the only ones to bring out the big guns. Sony revealed the Xperia 1, which packs top-end specs into a slick-looking handset with an impressive 4K screen.
LG’s V50 THINQ 5G also grabbed our attention, mainly because you can attach a second screen to the main device - a more affordable option than the first wave of fully-foldables.
Finally, XIAOMI announced the Mi 9, which looks, feels and performs like a top flagship mobile but will retail at around £400 – can’t say fairer than that!
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