GSMA Provides Further Updates on Mobile World Congress 2012

LONDON, February 7, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --

Facebook CTO Bret Taylor to Present at Mobile World Congress; New Companies Join mPowered Brands Programme, App Planet and Forum Series

The GSMA today announced further updates for the upcoming Mobile World Congress, which will be taking place 27 February - 1 March, 2012 at the Fira de Barcelona Montjuic in Barcelona. The GSMA outlined new developments in the conference programme, as well as new companies participating in App Planet and the mPowered Brands Programme.

"With more than 60,000 attendees expected in Barcelona, Mobile World Congress 2012 is shaping up to be the most exciting edition yet," said Michael O'Hara, Chief Marketing Officer, GSMA.  "With an unparalleled list of executives in the conference programme, and with new and varied companies, such as Carphone Warehouse, Citibank, eBay, Facebook, Ford and MTV, taking part in other areas of the event, it's clear that Mobile World Congress is the must-attend mobile event of the year. We're looking forward to a great show."

New Speakers at Mobile World Congress

The GSMA announced that Santiago Fernandez Valbuena, Chairman and CEO, Telefonica Latin America, will be speaking in the Mobile World Congress keynote programme, in a session focusing on mobile operator strategies in developing markets. The GSMA also announced that Bret Taylor, CTO of Facebook, will be presenting in a special Mobile World Live Extra session, kicking off the "Mobile Application" conference track at the Mobile World Congress conference.  This session will be held on Monday, 27 February and will be broadcast over the Internet and on Mobile World Live TV.

In addition to the keynote programme, the 2012 conference will also include dedicated tracks on applications, cloud computing, embedded mobile, mobile advertising, mobile health, mobile money, next-generation technologies and OSS/BSS, as well as sessions exploring business strategy, developing markets, devices, network capacity, regional issues and social media, among other subjects. The GSMA has partnered with the TM Forum to develop the "Business Transformation" conference track on Monday, 27 February, and with the NGMN Alliance to develop the "Technology Evolution" sessions taking place on Thursday, 1 March.  

For the list of keynote speakers, as well as complete information on the four-day conference programme, please go to http://www.mobileworldcongress.com/conference/.

New Participants in mPowered Brands Programme

Introduced for Mobile World Congress 2012, the mPowered Brands Programme provides an indispensable opportunity for professionals across the mobile marketing ecosystem to gain important and timely insights, practical knowledge and innovative solutions from the companies at the forefront of mobile marketing today.

A key element of the mPowered Brands Programme are the mPowered Brands Theatres, providing an environment for marketers, ad agencies, media companies and advertising technology companies to host clients and prospects and provide company and solutions updates, product and service demonstrations, case studies and workshops related to mobile marketing. mPowered Brands Theatre sessions at Mobile World Congress include:

• "Decoding the Future of Mobile Marketing and Enterprise Mobility" presented by Exicon in partnership with HP and Intel
• "Targeting the Women's Segment in Emerging Markets" presented by the GSMA mWomen Programme with Qualcomm's Wireless Reach™ Initiative and AusAID
• "McCann on the Mobile Economy" presented by McCann Worldgroup
• "The Future of the Social-Location Revolution" presented by Mobile-Loco in partnership with Nokia
• "An Uncommon Sense of the Consumer" presented by Nielsen
• "China: The Land of Opportunity" presented by the Shanghai International Film Festival

The mPowered Brands Programme also features the mPowered Brands Open Forum, an information sharing platform designed to bring together leading marketing companies with Mobile World Congress attendees. The Open Forum consists of six mobile marketing and advertising industry-oriented sessions delivered by representatives from Acision, ADTECH, comScore, Google Advertising, mCRUMBS, Microsoft Advertising and Soli. For more on the mPowered Brands Programme, please visit http://www.mobileworldcongress.com/mpoweredbrands-overview.

App Planet to Host ADCs by IBM and developerprogram.com

App Planet, the award-winning, developer community-focused "event within an event", allows attendees to explore the many dimensions of the ever-changing and critically important mobile apps market. The GSMA announced that IBM will hold an application developer conference (ADC) on Wednesday, 29 February and that developerprogram.com will run an ADC on Monday, 27 February.  Other App Planet partners include IMGA, Nokia, Research in Motion, Samsung and Wireless Industry Partnership (WIP). The Generalitat de Catalunya is the sponsor of App Planet. For more information on App Planet, please visit http://www.mobileworldcongress.com/appplanet.

Cloudmark Joins as Gold Sponsor for Mobile Security Forum

The GSMA announced a new partner in its Forum Series, a sponsored programme which brings together industry players to discuss and debate a range of topics in focused sessions.

Cloudmark recently signed on as a Gold Sponsor in the Mobile Security Forum, alongside AdaptiveMobile, Norton by Symantec and Trend Micro.  The sponsor for the Augmented Reality Forum is Khronos Group; sponsors for the LTE Forum include NEC, Openwave and ZTE; and sponsors for the Mobile Cloud Forum are Cisco and NEC.  Additionally, the Global TD-LTE Initiative (GTI) will hold its LTE TDD/FDD International Summit as part of the Forum Series at Mobile World Congress.  For more information on the Forum Series, please visit http://www.mobileworldcongress.com/forum-series.

GSMA Holds First Youth Programme at Mobile World Congress

For the first time at Mobile World Congress, the GSMA will be running a Mobile Youth Congress, a programme that will demonstrate to students how mobile can transform their lives, particularly in the area of education. Approximately 100 teenage students from Barcelona will participate in half-day sessions on Tuesday, 28 February and Wednesday, 29 February. The students will hear presentations from the GSMA and the iSchool Initiative, introducing them to the mobile industry and outlining innovative and productive uses of mobile technology. Following the presentations, the students will take a guided tour of the exhibition to experience the Mobile World Congress first-hand.  

For more information on Mobile World Congress 2012, including details on how to attend, exhibit or sponsor, please visit http://www.mobileworldcongress.com.

The Mobile World Congress is the cornerstone of the Mobile World Capital Barcelona from 2012 to 2018. The Mobile World Capital also includes the Mobile World Centre and the Mobile World Festival, programmes and activities that will span the entire year and will benefit not only the citizens of Barcelona, Catalonia and Spain, but also the worldwide mobile industry. For more information on the Mobile World Capital, please visit http://www.mobileworldcapital.com.

About the GSMA

The GSMA represents the interests of mobile operators worldwide. Spanning more than 220 countries, the GSMA unites nearly 800 of the world's mobile operators, as well as more than 200 companies in the broader mobile ecosystem, including handset makers, software companies, equipment providers, Internet companies, and media and entertainment organisations. The GSMA also produces industry-leading events such as the Mobile World Congress and Mobile Asia Expo. 

For more information, please visit the GSMA corporate website at http://www.gsma.com or Mobile World Live, the online portal for the mobile communications industry, at http://www.mobileworldlive.com