The fear aroused by the new coronavirus got the better of the Barcelona world mobile show (MWC), high mass in the sector canceled on Wednesday after a wave of withdrawals from major groups, while the Spanish authorities called on them not to give in to "the 'epidemic of fear'. The organizing association GSMA announced to have "canceled the MWC Barcelona 2020 because the global concern relating to the epidemic of coronavirus, the worries on the trips and other circumstances make impossible the organization of this event", planned from 24 to February 27. It is one of the most important international professional events to be canceled since the start of the epidemic, which left more than 1,100 people dead.
No case of the Covid-19 virus has been detected in mainland Spain, but two cases of infected patients - one British and one German - have been confirmed in the Balearic and Canary Islands, respectively.
A cascade of cancellations
The major telecom operators organizing the event had urgently convened a meeting on Wednesday afternoon, while the show had been confronted for several days with a series of cancellations from its most important participants, around thirty out of 2,800 companies registered. Latest on Wednesday: the Japanese online trade and services group Rakuten, the German operator Deutsche Telekom, the Finnish equipment supplier Nokia and the British operator Vodafone. Before them, the Americans Intel, Facebook, Cisco and Amazon had given up participating, just like the Chinese Vivo, the South Korean LG, the Swedish Ericsson, or the Japanese Sony and NTT DoCoMo.
Most said their employees' health was a "priority", with some acknowledging that it was an "extra precaution". The Korean giants Samsung and Chinese Huawei, on the other hand, maintained their participation, at the cost of important security measures such as the prior quarantine in their hotels of employees and managers of Huawei. The world mobile show has been held since 2006 in Barcelona and planned to welcome nearly 110,000 visitors for this edition, including more than 5,000 Chinese, according to GSMA.
The major cell phone manufacturers - with the exception of Apple - have traditionally presented their new products there.