Yes folks, Windows Phone Central is here in Barcelona for the annual Mobile World Congress, considered to be the largest trade show on all things, well, mobile. With an expected attendance of nearly 60K visitors, this year will be the biggest ever (and at a new location).
Myself along with our app developer and podcast co-host Jay Bennett will be here throughout the week bringing the latest and greatest news that comes out of here. So what on deck?
Tomorrow, Monday the 25th at 8:30am (2:30am ET on Monday) Nokia will be taking the stage for their major press conference. The expectation is for them to announce numerous new phones, including the Lumia 520, Lumia 720 and one or more high-end/flagship phones e.g. EOS. That latter device is expected to sport a 41MP camera sensor akin to the PureView 808 (announced here exactly one year ago).
Of course, this being Nokia and information on the EOS being so thin, anything is possible.
Likewise on the tablet front. Rumors for a Nokia tablet have been waxing and waning over the last few weeks and we wouldn’t rule out a tablet announcement for tomorrow either (either RT or Pro). We also wouldn’t bet on it. In other words we’re prepared for any surprises that Nokia may have and they usually have a few.
For those wondering about Microsoft, no they are not here, so there will no major Windows Phone 8 announcement. The Windows Phone Team is here, in an unofficial capacity and we’ll be having some drinks and chats with them on Tuesday evening. Who knows, maybe we’ll learn a thing or two along the way? (Translation: get the Windows Phone Team drunk).
Huawei is set to take the stage in just a few hours. Will they only show Android phones? We’re not sure which is why we’re headed down to see what all the hubbub. We’ll report back ASAP if we see anything.
CoPilot will be on hand later to show us their new navigation app for Windows Phone 8, so expect some video of that in action later on in the day.
LG is here but the latest we’re hearing is there won’t be any Windows Phones displayed. Some sites (making very tenuous connections) speculated that the Korean company would make their expected return to the Windows Phone fold this week, but that does not appear to be the case. Still, we’ll be around in case something does show.
Other than that, we have numerous meetings with some companies and developers and since the show has not kicked off yet, anything can possibly happen in the next few days. Sure there are “knowns” but there are also many more “unknowns” at this point, meaning you’ll want to tune in to Windows Phone Central for frequent updates!
Cheers, we’re off to figure out how Spanish showers work…
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