Facebook founder will participate in the opening day of the fair, bringing together more than 240 professionals | Co-founder and director of WhatsApp, Koum Jam, will be one of the protagonists of Congress.
Barcelona- founder and president of Facebook , Mark Zuckerberg , will be the guest star of the next edition of the Mobile World Congress ( MWC) , the World Congress of mobile phones , to be held from 24 to 27 February at the fairgrounds Gran Vía, in l’ Hospitalet de Llobregat , Barcelona .
The creator of the most popular social network in the world will participate in the opening day of this show , bringing together 240 speakers from various sectors , including the heads of the leading manufacturers , mobile operators and IT companies in the world , as the president of IBM Virginia Rometty , CEO of AT & T, Randall Stephenson, and the founder and director of WhatsApp, Koum Jam .
The MWC will return in five weeks to Barcelona, the capital of the world mobile phone with the expectation of returning to beat all records.
The GSMA , the leading association for the industry , the meeting organizer , expects this year ‘s event has an economic impact of 356 million euros ” in Barcelona , Catalonia and Spain ,” which is 11% more than in 2013 , and to help create more than 7,200 jobs part time.
Record revenue , jobs and public
GSMA CEO , John Hoffman , stated at a press conference that since 2006 Congress has left more than 2,000 million euros in the Spanish economy and has created 46,700 temporary jobs .
For this 2014 , organizers trust also exceed 72,000 attendees last year and reach 75,000 visitors , more than half of them officers or higher levels.
As for the number of exhibitors, the MWC meet this year some 1,800 companies , a hundred more than in the previous edition , of which 79 149 will be Spanish and Catalan . “The first year there was no Catalan represented company and now we have seven times more Spanish than in 2006 ,” he pointed Hoffman.
The meeting will also feature this year with a record attendance of ministerial delegations , as 145 countries sent official representatives to Barcelona, ” including about 80 ministers and some heads of state.”
In total , over 200 countries will be represented in Congress, led by the United States , China , United Kingdom , Germany, Spain and South Korea .
Among the ” impressive ” list of exhibitors include telephone operators , manufacturers, developers, IT giants and companies in other sectors , such as finance or automotive .
Some of the firms are Telefónica, Acer , Huawei, Sharp , Vodafone , Ford, Microsoft , HTC, MasterCard or IBM.
Apple, as usual, will not expose on the premises , but ” sure there will be people from the company here ,” said Hoffman , who also indicated that Google officially participate in the show through its Motorola Mobile division .
Points to improve : transportation and Dining
The MWC again occupy 98,000 square meters of exhibition of the Fira Gran Via , but this year will organize some events in the Montjuïc , where in 2006 started business .
Specifically , the facilities of the Maria Cristina avenue in Barcelona will host various sectoral meetings that bring together companies and clients to analyze mobility issues applied to areas such as health and tourism.
“It’s a little risky program, but we like a lot. Risk to grow , it is diluted or what we expect to happen , another ecosystem begins again in Montjuïc believed were running ,” stated Hoffman.
Despite the growth prospects for the next edition of the MWC, the CEO of the GSMA has recognized that there are some aspects that in 2013 ” did not meet expectations ” and try to improve , such as transportation to Fira, the restoration and location of exhibitors .
EXECUTIVE CHAUFFEUR BARCELONA 