Tuesday’s highlights at MWC26 Barcelona

Welcome to day two of this year’s event 

Breaking Bad habits: making the case for a more intentional digital life 

If you happened to be at BEAT Barcelona for an early drink yesterday, you missed a cracker of an afternoon keynote.  

Headlined by actor Aaron Paul sharing his thoughts on digital addiction and joined by Light’s CEO and Co-Founder Kaiwei Tang, the crowd was treated to a candid discussion about society’s increasingly strained relationship with smartphones and the business models designed to keep us hooked. 

Aaron doesn’t even own a computer, lamenting how his first laptop was stolen. “It felt like a part of my limb was taken away,” he recalled. “It was devastating. And then I just never got another one. And I realised how much more time I have on my hands.”  

Neither Aaron or Kaiwei were anti-tech or tech-sceptics, but both were clear about the trade-offs and deliberate about reclaiming attention from the tools built to capture it. You can watch Keynote 5 here. 

The original ‘web developer’ at Talent Arena 

“There are very few people I’ve met who had a world-changing idea and then gave it away for free.” The fireside chat between BBC journalist, Spencer Kelly and the inventor of the world wide web, Sir Tim Berners-Lee started in a suitably reverential way. Their conversation ranged far and wide, back to ancient times (1989) when Sir Tim developed his idea while working at CERN, and into the future with the potential of artificial general intelligence.   

They covered many other subjects. Why apostrophes aren’t used in URLs (the apostrophe is not a reserved character in HTML). How Sir Tim persuaded private companies that if all browsers spoke the same language, the internet could become huge, but if they were battling each other, it’d go nowhere (how right he was). And finally, the ‘stretch friend’ hack – add people to your social network that challenge the way you think to steer the algorithm away from echo chambers.   

Admiring the latest restrictions on social media use in Australia, Sir Tim talked about his own passion project Solid, designed to return the web to Tim’s original vision, resist companies that prioritise profit over people and put personal data back into the hands of those who own it.   

Tech titans join forces to launch OCUDU Ecosystem Foundation 

Monday’s MWC ended with a significant move for the future of wireless communications. During an intimate fireside chat, Dr. Tom Rondeau, Principal Director of U.S. Department of War's FutureG Office, and Mike Woster, Chief Revenue Officer of the Linux Foundation, announced the formation of the OCUDU Ecosystem Foundation.  

The public-private partnership establishes a global hub for developing a foundational, open-source software stack for 5G and 6G Radio Access Networks (RAN). Its founding members include AMD, AT&T, DeepSig, Ericsson, Nokia, NVIDIA, SoftBank, SRS and Verizon. The foundation’s goal is to provide a common, trusted platform that will accelerate innovation and interoperability for the next generation of network solutions and applications. Read more here.  

“With nearly 150 years of supporting government communications, we’re proud to partner with the Department of War and Linux Foundation effort in advancing an open, multi-vendor ecosystem,” said Jeff McElfresh, Chief Operating Officer, AT&T, Inc. 

Quote of the day 

“We can’t stand five seconds of boredom anymore. And boredom is great. Boredom is where creativity comes out.” 
Kaiwei Tang, CEO and Co-Founder, Light 

The Darling of robotics 

Kate Darling, author of The New Breed and former MIT researcher, seemed hardwired for controversy with her take on the future of robotics, positing that we should view robotic development through the lens of animal husbandry, not sci-fi. 

She argued our expectations for our robot friends are too high, saying that although there are many ways in which machines are smarter than us, they’re also prone to making strange mistakes. Like in a recent meeting where her team sang happy birthday to a colleague and the AI tool they were using for transcription merrily wished that same person a “happy death day”. Condolences. 

“It shouldn’t be our goal to re-create human skill, it should be to create something different,” she said, and explained that robots are most helpful and powerful when they’re supplementing something humans do, citing a robot vacuum (hello, ‘Meryl Sweep’) as a great example of success – it does one thing and it does it brilliantly. 

Do androids dream of MWC? Our showfloor robot round-up 

As you’ve just read, robots are big news at this year’s MWC. If you’ve spent longer than five minutes in the exhibition halls this week, you’ll have seen how just how many are on the showfloor.  

From serving food to busting a move, and impeccable bedside manners to frantic factory floors, here’s our run-down of MWC’s most impressive mechanical marvels. 

• China Mobile (Hall 3): Fancy a cuppa? China Mobile's robot restaurant is serving up tea and nibbles.
• SK Telecom (Hall 3): SK Telecom have recreated a miniature factory floor where attendees can get behind the controls of remote forklifts. Whether it's a cutting-edge demonstration of industrial 5G connectivity or an elaborate game of bumper cars very much depends on who's at the controls.
• AGIBOT (Hall 6): Dotted around the halls all week, AGIBOT's X2 humanoid robot has been putting on quite the show: friendly waves, tai chi, champagne service and full-on dancing.
• GSMA Foundry x NUHS (Hall 6, New Frontiers):  A partnership between GSMA Foundry and Singapore's National University Health System. Powered by AI and 5G, this intelligent robot nurse companion can autonomously navigate hospital wards, deliver medicines and monitor patients with sensors. A friendly face on its screen and a genuine real-world use case, it’s one of the most heartwarming things on the showfloor this week. 

An electric atmosphere at 4YFN  

Bright lights, neon-drenched corridors and funky, soulful beats can only mean one thing.  

You're entering 4YFN. The place where wild ideas get their wings and underdogs become unicorns. 

Browsing Halls 8.0 and 8.1, you’re surrounded by ambitious founders and wonderful ideas from all corners of the globe. Haptic tech that can enhance how you game and watch sports, AI-powered jewellery design, a smart indoor garden app, and a VR jetpack experience that saw this lucky writer soaring over snow-capped mountains and sleepy Italian villages without ever leaving Fira. 

The countdown is also on for the 4YFN Awards Finale. For this year’s five worthy finalists (announced yesterday, check them out here), it’ll be the most nerve-shredding few hours of their lives.  

In front of a panel of leading investors and a no-nonsense audience, the electric pitching competition takes place on the Banco Sabadell Stage, Hall 8.0 tomorrow (Wednesday March 4) at 17:00.