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Intel won’t be participating in Mobile World Congress.
Photograph by David Silverman/Getty Images
AT&T is the latest major company to cancel planned participation in the coming Mobile World Congress trade show in Barcelona on concerns about the continuing spread of novel coronavirus.
AT&T’s (ticker: T) decision Tuesday came on the heels of Cisco Systems and
Intel’s
announcements to back out of the world’s biggest smartphone conference.
“We value our participation in important industry groups like GSMA and deeply respect the steps they have already taken to protect attendees,” the telecom said in a statement. “Unfortunately, the most responsible decision is to withdraw our participation from the event to safeguard our employees and customers.”
Cisco (ticker: CSCO) said in a statement Tuesday: “Our company sincerely appreciates everything that Mobile World Congress has done to protect its attendees, and we look forward to participating in future events. We continue to keep those directly impacted by this situation in our thoughts and prayers.”
Intel (INTC) said its employees and partners’ well-being “is our top priority, and we have withdrawn from this year’s Mobile World Congress out of an abundance of caution.”
The number of companies that have backed out of the world’s biggest smartphone conference, scheduled to start later this month, is growing by the day. Here’s the current list of the companies that have canceled their participation, as of Monday night:
- LG Electronics
-
Ericsson
(ERIC) -
Sony
(SNE) -
Amazon.com
(AMZN) -
Nvidia
(NVDA) -
Amdocs
(DOX) - NTT DoCoMo (Japanese wireless service provider)
-
InterDigital
(IDCC) -
CommScope Holding
(COMM) -
Viavi Solutions
(VIAV) - Intel
- Cisco
- AT&T
- Accedian (Canada-based performance analytics company)
- Gigaset (German phone maker)
- Sprintrade (Italian ad network)
- Umidigi (China-based smartphone company)
- Ulefone (China-based smartphone company)
- Vivo (handset maker)
- MediaTek (chip maker)
The China-based tech companies ZTE and TCL have canceled planned news conferences, but still plan to participate in the event.
As of Sunday, there were no plans to cancel the conference, which most years attracts more than 100,000 attendees from around the world. The GSMA, a trade association which sponsors the event, seems determined to carry on, despite the growing number of defections.
“The GSMA knows that the coronavirus has created disruption, in particular for exhibitors and attendees from around the world, including the 5-6,000 (5-6%) who have historically attended from China,” the group said in a blog post. “Our sympathy goes to all those affected…Today, the GSMA is moving ahead as planned and will host MWC Barcelona 24-27 February 2020. While the GSMA confirm some large exhibitors have decided not to come to the show this year with others still contemplating next steps, we remain more than 2,800 exhibitors strong.”
That said, as more companies pull out—and the pattern suggests the list is going to lengthen in the coming days—there will be growing questions about the wisdom of holding the show this year as scheduled if there is even modest risk to exhibitors and attendees.
Write to Eric J. Savitz at eric.savitz@barrons.com
