Álvarez-Pallete (Telefónica): "What is happening in Ukraine reminds us that technology has no value"

The Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona, ​​the first major international event that suffered a cancellation in 2020 due to covid-19, has started its 2022 edition this Monday, conditioned not only by the pandemic (50% is expected of potential assistance) but also due to the invasion of Russian troops, a country that has come up against a veto on its pavilion at the Fira facilities.

José María Álvarez-Pallete, president of Telefónica, is also president of the GSMA, the telecommunications employers' association that organizes this congress, and has opened the event with a warning: "The upheavals of the 20th century and the disconcerting events at the dawn of the 21st century, like what is happening right now in Ukraine, have reminded us that technology has no value.

In this sense, the executive has reflected on one of the edges of the armed conflict: the technological one.

Western sanctions, in fact, are largely aimed at weakening

, as the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, advanced, and in parallel to the clash in Ukrainian territory, a cyberwar is underway in which even the Anonymous collective is already participating, also facing President Vladimir Putin.

"Technology gives us the power to change and to do more things, but that power can be used for good or for bad.

to the detriment of solidarity, social empathy or mere contact between people... society mistrusts them and those who provide them". As Álvarez-Pallete has pointed out, "this is not a time for confrontation or conflict;

This is not a time of war, but of collaboration."

"Technology has allowed us to change things and do many new things, but we are the ones who must decide what and how to do it", stressed Álvarez-Pallete, who has defended the role of telecommunications in the current geopolitical and economic scenario: "We are the door to the future.

", he stressed.

"We deserve respect"

As usual in his messages from Telefónica, Álvarez-Pallete has pointed out the disadvantage in regulation of this industry compared to the most recent of the American technological giants;

Also heading the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSMA) association since January, the man from Madrid has gone a step further in his position: "We respect all the actors in the new economy, but we also

.

It is impossible to face the new times with the old rules.

Our sector does not ask for privileges, but justice", he has said: "Data traffic grows up to 50% per year.

The investment challenge is enormous and deserves special attention.

The burden of the investment necessary to manage this growing volume of traffic must fall fairly", he argued. To face these investments, many of them dedicated to 5G, the possibility of consolidation operations prospering is on the table, mergers that may affect companies such as Orange, Vodafone or MásMóvil in Spain (Telefónica is more closely watched by both the Government and the European competition authorities).

"East and West; inequality and equal opportunities; lies and truth", opposed the executive president of the Spanish multinational, who manifested himself as a "concerned optimist".

In his opinion, "collaboration, cooperation, solidarity, responsibility, sustainability and dignity" must form "an ecosystem of shared values."

Before Álvarez-Pallete, he addressed the Mobile audience Mats Granryd, general director of the GSMA association, who explained to the applause of the audience present that

.

The 2020 Mobile could not be held due to the coronavirus, when the state of alarm had not yet been declared in Spain, and in 2021 the GSMA only managed to shape a minimum edition, based on a remote model rather than face-to-face.

This 2022 was the planned year to relaunch the congress, but the events in Ukraine are currently turning all eyes towards the East and the expected figures are around 40% or 50% of the pre-pandemic magnitudes.

Thus, this Mobile will welcome between 40,000 and 60,000 professionals, approximately 1,500 companies and 6,700 temporary workers, all this to generate an economic impact in the city that the organization estimates at 240 million euros (around 500 million euros in 2020) .

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Know more

• Telephone

• Ukraine

• Russia

• Vladimir Putin

• Ursula von der Leyen

• European Comission

• Jose Maria Alvarez-Pallete

• Coronavirus

• Barcelona

• Mobile World Congress

• covid 19

• Companies

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