Accessing #MWC18 could be as easy as looking in the mirror. PwC US and MEXIA One are attending GSMA's Mobile World Congress 2018 and will be conducting a demo of facial recognition technology. This is an exciting new technology with many industry uses; see one application at the event entrance. This year, eligible attendees can opt in to be part of the demo using "biometrics"--validated facial recognition via a face scan compared to a profile picture (clear, forward-facing head shot)--to access the event in addition to using their badge. For attendees who opt into the demo, biometric token data will be destroyed following MWC.

But with no major innovations awaited in handsets, analysts expect the four-day Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona to focus on new uses for artificial intelligence (AI) and the looming deployment of super-fast 5G wireless networks.

Artificial Intelligence is transforming the world. Through a convergence of technology leaps, social transformations, and genuine economic needs, AI is moving from its academic roots to the forefront of business and industry. In this report, we examine how companies in three economic sectors--telecommunications, retail, and financial services--are tackling new challenges and opportunities by incorporating AI into their products and operations. Every nook and cranny of the modern economy will eventually feel AI's impact, from energy, transportation, and healthcare to manufacturing, entertainment, education, IT, and government. And the boom in AI development will lead to greater demand for hardware and services among growing AI developer communities.

By Stefan Nicola and Joe Mayes Mobile World Congress, the wireless industry's biggest conference, begins next week in Barcelona, where more than 100,000 people are set to see the latest smartphones, artificial intelligence devices and autonomous drones exhibited by roughly 2,300 companies. The event is also the industry's largest networking opportunity for executives, bankers, analysts and the like to talk shop -- and potential deals. Some 5,500 CEOs, among them Deutsche Telekom AG's Tim Hoettges and Vodafone Group Plc's Vittorio Colao, will jostle for airtime discussing the major trends shaping the industry such as cybersecurity, the arrival of ultrafast fifth-generation mobile networks and blockchain. Here are the big themes likely to dominate the event: Samsung to Sony in device battle MWC has long been a venue for companies to show off their latest mobile devices and vie for consumer attention. This year, Samsung is back to unveil its latest flagship phone, widely expected to be the Galaxy S9.

Visitors walk past a 5G logo during the Mobile World Congress on the third day of the MWC in Barcelona, on March 1, 2017. The new year for smartphones is about to dawn. The South Korean electronics giant is is the headline exhibitor at the Mobile World Congress trade show that commences over the weekend, drawing some 108,000 attendees to the mobile industry's annual signature shindig. The S9 represents Samsung's turn to try and leapfrog Apple's most recent iPhones, as the rivals resume their bottomless battle for smartphone supremacy. Leaks point to a Galaxy phone with, among other features, an improved camera system.

Google Assistant had its coming out party at Mobile World Congress 2017 with the announcement that it was expanding beyond Google's own Pixel phones, and now it's ready to take on the world. Google has announced it will be expanding Assistant to nearly two dozen more languages this year as it expands its influence to some "95 percent of all eligible Android phones worldwide." Google Assistant already speaks English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Spanish, and Portuguese (Brazil), but its linguist capabilities will be greatly expanded over the next 10 months as Google plans to add support for more than 30 languages. First up will be Danish, Dutch, Hindi, Indonesian, Norwegian, Swedish and Thai, all of which should arrive by summer. Along with the new languages comes support for multilingual speakers.

Today's Google Assistant is much, much more capable than the version that first debuted on the original Pixel and Pixel XL. Don't expect that progress to slow anytime soon, either: Google laid out some new plans to improve the Assistant just in time for Mobile World Congress, and they extend far beyond just teaching it more languages. Most importantly, Google confirmed it has been working with smartphone makers on ways to weave Assistant more elegantly into our smartphones. That work is being formalized in the new Assistant Mobile OEM program, and Google's list of accomplishments with its partners is nothing to sneeze at: it helped make Assistant compatible with certain kinds of mobile AI coprocessor and worked to make sure devices can listen for the right wake-words even when their screens are off. It won't be long before you start to see device-specific Google Assistant commands, either -- LG touted a list of 23 new commands for its updated V30, and Google also cited close working relationships with companies like Sony and Xiaomi.

The Huawei #Mate10Pro has the power to be so much more. Here's what happened when we pushed its object recognition to new limits – using it to pilot a #driverlesscar. Disclaimer: Images were recorded by professionals in closed circuit and under due surveillance to prevent any animal or personal harm. This video has been created for exclusive marketing purposes to demonstrate the potential ability of artificial intelligence included on Huawei devices, this feature is not commercially available on any Huawei device. Huawei strongly discourages public to replicate the action and this video shall not be understood to encourage people to mistreat others or animals nor to use Huawei devices in cars as a driverless tool.

Unlike other driverless cars, which simply detect obstacles, Huawei's RoadReacher project claims to have turned a Porsche Panamera into a driverless vehicle that does not just see, it "understands" its surroundings. Using the image recognition AI-chip embedded in the Huawei Mate 10, the car can now distinguish between thousands of different objects such as: cat or dog, or, ball or bike, and take the most appropriate action. "Our smartphone is already outstanding at object recognition. We wanted to see if in a short space of time we could teach it to not only drive a car, but to use its AI capabilities to see certain objects, and be taught to avoid them" said Andrew Garrihy, chief marketing officer, Huawei Western Europe. Huawei will be showcasing the RoadReader project and the vehicle's capabilities at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona from 26 to 27 February.

Maximizing intelligence on client devices residing on the edge of the network ensures AI-powered user experiences can be realized with better overall performance and with or without a network connection. The key benefits of on-device AI include real-time responsiveness, improved privacy, and enhanced reliability. Supported within the AI Engine, Snapdragon core hardware architectures – Qualcomm Hexagon Vector Processor, Qualcomm Adreno GPU and Qualcomm Kryo CPU – are engineered to run AI applications quickly and efficiently on-device. This heterogeneous computing approach gives developers and OEMs the ability to optimize AI user experiences on smartphones and other edge devices. "On-device AI demands multiple hardware architectures, software tools, and frameworks to meet developer demand and performance thresholds for the myriad of AI-powered features and apps arriving on smartphones this year," said Gary Brotman, director of product management, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. "The AI Engine capabilities of select Snapdragon mobile platforms have and will continue to fuel AI innovation among our OEMs and ecosystem partners, and are engineered to accelerate the development and delivery of rich, seamless and compelling features for consumers."