How War in the Middle East Impacted the World's Largest Mobile Phone Show

On a Tuesday in the center of Mobile World Congress 2026, three {industry} consultants gathered for a panel to talk about sensible glasses and prolonged actuality tech. However a fourth member of the panel, who was primarily based in Dubai, by no means made it to the convention. Two days earlier than, the US and Israel launched airborne assaults on Iran, and flights had been grounded all through the Middle East.

Even 1000’s of miles away in Barcelona, on the western fringe of the Mediterranean Sea, MWC was affected by the battle. Whereas occasions and conferences at the world’s largest cell tech convention proceeded as deliberate, albeit below the anxious consciousness of bigger geopolitical occasions, there have been notable absences. 

Some cubicles stood empty, and a few conferences scheduled between absent attendees weren’t held. Exhibitors walked the halls and noticed a diminished presence from Middle Japanese firms.

Whereas the battle was simply starting as MWC came about, it had already affected attendees and altered the expertise. Whereas distant from the combating in the Middle East, the conflict’s influence was simply as significantly felt in the center of a convention about bringing people collectively.

The monetary, emotional and psychological price of conflict on a tech convention

The fourth panelist on Tuesday’s panel was alleged to be Roman Axelrod, cofounder of Xpanceo, who would have doubtless mentioned the sensible contact lenses the firm supposed to point out off in prototype type at MWC. However neither Axelrod nor the samples ever left Dubai, the place the firm relies. Convention attendees who walked by Xpanceo’s sales space had been greeted by workers who had flown in from elsewhere and apologized that they’d solely rapidly made video demonstrations of the expertise samples that had been alleged to be on show.

I had already deliberate to talk with Valentyn S. Volkov, co-founder and CTO of Xpanceo, who likewise did not make it to MWC. Whereas the firm was deliberately headquartered in Dubai as a dependable and predictable jurisdiction for enterprise (in addition to centrally situated, with many enterprise locations inside a 7-hour flight), the nation falls inside the airspace of the present battle. Because of this, companies are shedding cash, particularly funds spent on alternatives at MWC.

“We already form of misplaced, I’d say, a major quantity of assets — bodily, psychological, scientific assets — just because we couldn’t get everybody to Barcelona. We couldn’t get our prototypes to Barcelona as deliberate,” Volkov instructed me.

Happily, Volkov was in good spirits once I chatted with him over Zoom through a laptop computer in Xpanceo’s sales space. He was secure, noting that native authorities in Dubai had been offering “logistic safeness.” 

Our chat shortly turned to the sensible contact lenses that the firm is engaged on, with plans to roll out functioning prototypes by the finish of the yr. As Volkov described their potential capabilities, they gave the impression of the subsequent evolution of sensible glasses, like the Google Specs that I noticed at Google I/O final yr, providing heads-up show info relayed from a close-by telephone, and even probably well being information like glucose stage readings taken from the lens’ contact with the eye’s tears.

“These beauties had been alleged to be proven for the very first time [at MWC], and we put a number of effort and assets into that. It is utterly dangerous luck,” Volkov stated.

Due to fashionable community expertise, Volkov and I had been nonetheless capable of have this digital dialog — and luckily, the conflict had not affected him or the infrastructure the place he was. However anybody can inform you the worth of getting an in-person alternate over one on small screens. What was misplaced by the wires as a result of Volkov wasn’t there to display options and ideas of Xpanceo’s merchandise by physique language and demonstration?

It is not laborious to think about scaling that as much as all the enterprise conversations and networking alternatives misplaced to these whose flights had been canceled and lives locked down because of the battle in the Middle East. A few of these conferences might doubtless be shifted to digital chats like mine, however MWC is a present about making new connections in individual, seeing new gadgets and getting up to date on the newest tech tendencies throughout the cell and telecom industries. 

However I met some attendees who had been struggling the reverse destiny, having flown out early from international locations now in restricted airspace. They made it to MWC, but it surely’s too early to inform once they can fly residence.

Stranded at MWC, return unknown

I sat down with Stated Saidi, an exhibitor at the present, and chatted in between his calls residence. I could not think about the pressure he was below with household again in Dubai and no clear concept of when he’d have the ability to rejoin them. 

A resident of the United Arab Emirates for 19 years, Saidi was comforted to have the ability to chat together with his household on the telephone each few hours, who he stated had been secure. Except for noise made by the protection system and drones coming from Iran, his experiences from residence stated everybody resides peacefully and has no scarcity of provides, and so they have thus far had no main stress.

Saidi defined that this was counter to misinformation being unfold on social media that claims folks have been caught in the UAE with out lodging. As he stated, and experiences have echoed, the authorities and lodges have offered stranded vacationers with free stays.

Saidi caught an early flight out to Barcelona the earlier Friday, however most different exhibitors from the Middle East normally fly out on Sunday, he stated. By then, industrial flights from the space had been largely grounded following the preliminary strikes by the US and Israel on Saturday morning. He stated the influence of this region-wide air journey blackout was stark. After strolling round the present flooring twice, even all the manner out to the startup space at the far finish of the conference heart, the presence of attendees from the Middle East is “close to zero,” Saidi stated. 

Whereas he made it to MWC, a lot of the conferences Saidi was alleged to have with friends from different Middle Japanese firms needed to be canceled or held on-line. It is a loss throughout.

“Often, the principal goal of the exhibition is to point out that we’re current, we’re there, and in addition to fulfill new leads and new enterprise,” Saidi stated. Whereas executives might usually transfer in their very own circles, at MWC, they are often met on the present flooring by anybody. “The exhibition is all the time a great likelihood to fulfill folks and do this first handshake and construct on it,” Saidi stated.

Ready for the limbo to carry, however the influence stays

In three days of operating round the MWC present flooring, I attempted to gauge the scope of those absences. None was extra apparent than in the startup space, 4YFN, which was crammed with firm representatives from each nook of the Earth — besides a strand representing the Palestinian Data Expertise Affiliation of Firms. Simply two cubicles had been manned out of what was alleged to be seven, with the remainder of the startup representatives unable to fly to the present.

The representatives who had been there politely declined to remark for this story and weren’t positive once they’d have the ability to fly again. 

Saidi stated the similar. Whereas he asserted that his firm was caring for him, and that he felt completely relaxed so long as his household was secure again in Dubai, he had no inkling of when he’d have the ability to return residence.  

“I’ve zero expectations,” Saidi stated. “At this level in time, we can not predict something.”

From inside Dubai, throughout our dialog, Xpanceo’s Volkov had a extra optimistic outlook, with important hope that the state of affairs would stabilize inside per week. But when it’s a extended challenge, he stated his firm can be ready for that, too. And work is constant remotely in the meantime. 

The conflict is prone to have an effect on the cell {industry} past MWC. Analysts have adjusted their beforehand dim projection on 2026’s anticipated telephone gross sales to a good bleaker outlook, anticipating a 13% drop over the yr. Principally, they blame the RAM scarcity, which is plaguing the tech {industry} as AI information facilities gobble up reminiscence. 

However once I chatted with Worldwide Knowledge Company’s Jeronimo Francisco, he famous that the regional chaos of the conflict with Iran contributed to that drop, at the least in phrases of disrupting provide chains, growing the price of oil and forcing firms to search out workarounds for wartime bottlenecks.

“If there was no reminiscence disaster, as a substitute of the market dropping 13% it will drop 5 in the worst-case situation, one thing like that,” Francisco stated. 

It was a poignant second for the cell {industry}. Whilst the AI industry-caused RAM scarcity is poised to extend telephone costs in 2026, MWC was awash in firm slogans embracing AI brokers and different purposes of generative AI. Satellite tv for pc firms heralded the period of accelerating connectivity past the vary of conventional cell networks. Going to the present is a chance to catch wind of thrilling tendencies awaiting telephone house owners in the months to return. 

However even when MWC appears like being in a bubble of wonky information and enthusiastic predictions, generally the bubble is popped by world occasions that considerably disrupt lives. At CNET, we now have coated a number of the coolest discoveries we made at the largest telephone present of the yr — however even immersed in the deepest telephone dives, it is necessary to recollect the human influence of conflicts that attain 1000’s of miles to a conference heart in a Catalonian seashore city.