TOPSIGNAL

We sincerely invite you to attend the Mobile World Congress Shanghai (MWC Shanghai) 2025 to be held at the Shanghai New International Expo Center from June 18th to 20th. This is Asia's largest and most influential connectivity ecosystem event, where global leaders and innovators will share their insights on future connectivity.

Every year, when the global communication circle "workers" flock to MWC, Chinese manufacturers always do two things: show off their technology and be asked by foreigners "When will you hold your own MWC?" In the past few days, Yushu Robotics has played a lot, Transsion has blown up the scene with its three-fold folding phone, and Honor has announced its AI ecological strategy... But after the excitement, a question is asked: China's communication industry GDP is almost the top in the world, why can't its own home field support a world-class "Technology Spring Festival Gala"?

Why can MWC only have the surname "Europe"?

Welcome to the Shanghai World Mobile Communications Conference on June 18!

China's communication industry is no longer "Wuxia Amon": 5G base stations account for 60% of the world, Huawei and ZTE have entered the top five in the world, and 6G patents directly account for 40% - this is enough, right? But when it comes to international discourse power, it immediately breaks down. MWC is an exhibition on the surface, but in fact it is a "global communication circle of friends" led by GSMA, where standard setting, commercial tearing, and trend betting are all in open and secret struggles. What about us? No matter how many 5G patents there are, they still have to "fight" with Europe and the United States at the standard conference; no matter how much the equipment sells, it will still be "stuck" in the international patent pool.

To put it bluntly, MWC cannot be copied by building a big booth. They are playing with ecological hegemony: operators, chip factories, coders, and VCs are all involved, from ministerial forums to toilet socializing, there is business everywhere. In contrast, domestic exhibitions have either become "state-owned enterprise report performances" or "technical temple fairs" for enterprises to have fun on their own - foreigners can only serve as atmosphere groups, who will pay you real money?

Three major pain points

Don't turn the exhibition into a "local area network"

Now it's the right time to hold a Chinese version of MWC: AI has brought a "second spring" to the communications industry, the battle for 6G has begun, and computing power networks have reconstructed the industrial chain. But if the three major flaws are not cured, it will overturn in minutes.

International content is too low

MWC Barcelona has 70% of overseas exhibitors, and our PT exhibition and MWC Shanghai are still struggling with domestic substitution. When foreigners come, they can only watch Chinese manufacturers "unilaterally output" and can't even set up a stage for a fight - this is not globalization, it's simply a "cyber overseas promotional film".

Ecological closed loop kills itself

International top exhibitions dare to let Apple and Qualcomm fight each other, Samsung and Huawei compete, but domestic exhibitions always want to make peace. What's the result? They dare not argue about technical routes, dare not expose business routines, and finally become an industry party of "hello, me, everyone" - it's strange that the audience doesn't fall asleep!

If you can't make a living, don't force it

Why can MWC make global coders squeeze in at their own expense? In addition to watching the exhibition, they can get the industry predictions of the GSMA think tank, watch the battle of start-ups, and bet on the next decade. Our exhibitions are still competing for whose booth is bigger and whose leader's speech is longer - young people think it's a waste of time to swipe their phones.

Breaking the situation requires ruthlessness

From "problem solver" to "rule player"

If you want to build a Chinese version of MWC, don't always think about "overtaking on the curve", first understand these three axes.

The first knife: cut off the "paternalistic" style

The exhibition is a place of rivers and lakes, not a court! Fewer speeches by leaders, more "global tearing conferences". Invite the bigwigs of GSMA and ETSI (European Telecommunications Standards Institute) to confront, and let European, American, Japanese and Korean operators complain about the Chinese solution in person - won't the traffic come?

The second knife: Make the cake bigger, don't just focus on dividing the cake

Learn how MWC plays the ecosystem: Huawei shows base stations? It must be accompanied by Deutsche Telekom's landing cases; ZTE brags about AI? Immediately pull out Amazon Cloud to stand on the stage. Let foreigners feel that coming to China to participate in the exhibition is not "giving you face", but "making money".

The third knife: let young people get excited

The most exciting operation of MWC is to package boring technology into a "tech show" - metaverse disco, AI fortune-telling, robot cocktail making... Is our exhibition still showing PPT and rolling banners? Let the big companies quickly pull out the black technology in the laboratory to show fans, and then have a "communication industry weird talk", are you afraid that there will be no hot searches?

The "cultural output" of the communication industry should be strengthened

When TikTok can force the US Congress to break down, and Genshin Impact can make foreigners spend krypton gold to the top, there is no reason why the Chinese communication industry cannot create its own "technological cultural IP". No matter how fragrant the coffee at MWC Barcelona is, it can't brew the secret battle for the formulation of 6G standards. Instead of going to other people's home courts every year to be an "excellent student", it is better to drag the global industrial chain to the Chinese battlefield-after all, those who can define the exhibition are qualified to define the future.