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MWC 2021 day two: Is this thing on?
Listen, it’s probably not the best sign when a show feels like it’s running out of steam on its first day. Mobile World Congress’ opening salvo was headlined by Samsung in an event that touched on some partnerships and spent equal time teasing an upcoming event where it will actually launch some hardware. It’s hard to get too down on the GSMA, and I really ought to preface all of these by reiterating that – even in a normal year – running an event is hard as hell. Canceling its flagship show last year had to be gut-wrenching, and deciding to go forward with this one must have also been – albeit for dramatically different reasons?
It’s not like the show didn’t come with some wins. What’s that? Elon Musk videoed in? That’s a pretty massive get by any measure, with all of the standard “whatever you think about the guy” preambles. Love him or hate, you’ve heard about him and probably have extremely strong feelings about the dude, one way or another.
Image Credits: Mobile World Congress (opens in a new window)
The High Priest of Dogeking beamed in to talk SpaceX StarLink. “To be totally frank, we are losing money on that terminal right now,” Musk said in the interview. “That terminal costs us more than $1,000, so obviously I’m subsidizing the cost of the terminal.” Good thing he’s got deep pockets.
He promised a new version of the company’s satellite next year, “which will be significantly more capable.”
Huawei thus far has focused much more on networking than consumer – it’s important to caveat this by adding that MWC is as much, if not more, a networking show, in spite of all of the press that tends to focus on consumer device launches. The company launched a bunch of 5G networking hardware, including several MIMO products.
Speaking of networks, I totally forgot to include this bit from TechCrunch parent co (you know, for now). Verizon trotted out a bunch of robots with 5G branding. The company was making a point about the importance of cellular for future robotics communication.
Here’s CSO Rima Qureshi, quoted by Reuters, “5G will make it possible for robots to connect with other robots and devices of all kinds in a way that simply wasn’t possible before.”
Image Credits: Huawei
Let’s be honest, though, mostly robots make for cool stage fodder. From what I can tell, the Boston Dynamics-esque quadruped was this bot from Ghost Robotics, which Verizon also trotted out (well, it trotted itself out, I suppose) at CES in January:
Given the choice, would I have put on an in-person event in Barcelona in the summer of 2021? No. Nuh-uh. No way. Did the GSMA feel like they had a choice financially or otherwise? That’s a much more difficult question to answer. When you’re a company that runs on events and partnerships, even canceling a single big show is a shock to the system.
I’m going back and forth on whether I’ll be doing any more of these roundups as the show progresses through Thursday. Definitely if some more interesting stuff shows up, or if there’s like video of Elon hoverboarding through the sparsely populated convention center halls or something. But I’m not holding my breath.
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Daily Crunch: Mobile World Congress is canceled
The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 9am Pacific, you can subscribe here.
1. GSMA cancels Mobile World Congress due to coronavirus concerns
“The GSMA has cancelled MWC Barcelona 2020 because the global concern regarding the coronavirus outbreak, travel concern and other circumstances, make it impossible for the GSMA to hold the event,” CEO John Hoffman said in a statement.
Over the past few days, dozens of big name exhibitors announced they would skip this year’s show. MWC usually attracts more than 100,000 attendees from 200 countries to Barcelona.
2. Andy Rubin’s Essential shuts down
Essential was supposed to disrupt the smartphone industry, but it struggled with bad timing, broader industry issues and a founder embroiled in troubling allegations of sexual misconduct, ultimately failing to make it far beyond the launch of its first handset.
3. Astranis raises $90 million for its next-gen satellite broadband internet service
The funding will be used to help the company launch its first commercial satellites, which will be the bedrock of its future internet service offering, aimed at connecting the massive market of underserved populations around the world. The company’s focus on geostationary satellites — rather than satellites that hand off their connection through a kind of relay system — makes it different from many of the other entrants in the satellite internet race.
4. A new senate bill would create a US data protection agency
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) has published a bill which, if passed, would create a U.S. federal data protection agency designed to protect the privacy of Americans, with the authority to enforce data practices across the country.
5. Will Apple, Facebook or Microsoft be the future of augmented reality?
While there are more AR platforms than the big three mentioned in the headline, Digi-Capital’s Tim Merel argues that they represent the top of the pyramid for three different types of AR roadmap. (Extra Crunch membership required.)
6. Facebook Dating launch blocked in Europe after it fails to show privacy workings
Facebook has been left red-faced after being forced to call off the launch date of its dating service in Europe because it failed to give its lead EU data regulator enough advanced warning, and it failed to demonstrate it had performed a legally required assessment of privacy risks.
7. Intuition Robotics raises $36M for its empathetic digital companion
The company, best known for its ElliQ home robot for the elderly, also disclosed that it’s working with the Toyota Research Institute to bring its technology to the automaker’s LQ concept. Intuition’s goal is to build digital assistants that can create emotional bonds between humans and machines.
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GSMA cancels Mobile World Congress due to coronavirus concerns
The GSMA, the organization behind MWC, the world’s largest mobile trade show, has announced that it is officially canceling the show. MWC usually attracts more than 100,000 attendees from 200 countries to Barcelona. This year’s show was supposed to take place on February 24-27.
Several publications received a statement about the cancellation. “The GSMA has cancelled MWC Barcelona 2020 because the global concern regarding the coronavirus outbreak, travel concern and other circumstances, make it impossible for the GSMA to hold the event,” GSMA CEO John Hoffman told Bloomberg and the Financial Times. El Diario, El País and La Vanguardia also report that the show has been canceled.
The GSMA has now published a statement confirming its decision to cancel — writing:
Since the first edition of Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in 2006, the GSMA has convened the industry, governments, ministers, policymakers, operators and industry leaders across the broader ecosystem.
With due regard to the safe and healthy environment in Barcelona and the host country today, the GSMA has cancelled MWC Barcelona 2020 because the global concern regarding the coronavirus outbreak, travel concern and other circumstances, make it impossible for the GSMA to hold the event.
The Host City Parties respect and understand this decision.
The GSMA and the Host City Parties will continue to be working in unison and supporting each other for MWC Barcelona 2021 and future editions.
Our sympathies at this time are with those affected in China, and all around the world.
Further updates from the GSMA, are on our website and can be found on www.mwcbarcelona.com.
Over the past few days, dozens of big names announced they would skip this year’s show. LG first announced that it wouldn’t attend the trade show, citing safety concerns related to the coronavirus outbreak. Nvidia and Ericsson followed suit.
On Sunday, the GSMA sent a long coronavirus-related email to registered attendees. The association wanted to reassure attendees by demonstrating that it would implement tough restrictions.
Here’s what GSMA CEO John Hoffman wrote:
- All travellers from the Hubai province will not be permitted access to the event
- MWC Barcelona, Four Years From Now (4YFN), xside and YoMo
- All travellers who have been in China will need to demonstrate proof they have been outside of China 14 days prior to the event (passport stamp, health certificate)
- Temperature screening will be implemented
- Attendees will need to self-certify they have not been in contact with anyone infected.
But that email made things even worse.
Dozens of companies pulled out of the trade show. In other words, some of the top consumer electronics and telecom companies got scared. And those who thought that GSMA had things under control started to cancel their attendance as well — it wasn’t worth going to Barcelona if many important partners had already canceled.
Some of the companies that announced they wouldn’t be attending include Amazon, Deutsche Telekom, Ericsson, Facebook, HMD, Intel, LG, Nokia, NTT Docomo, Sony and Sprint.
GSMA’s lawyers wanted to make sure that the association wouldn’t be held accountable if there was a single case of coronavirus at the show. But they started another virus — companies pulling out one by one.
As companies usually spend millions of dollars to secure exhibit space and send large teams, canceling MWC altogether is going to be an unexpected financial blow for the GSMA.
According to a report from El País, the GSMA originally planned to meet on Friday and consider the next steps. The association held an emergency meeting earlier today in order to make a decision more quickly.
MWC originally started as a trade show for carriers. Big telecom companies would meet up with hardware vendors and discuss the evolution of telecommunications networks. More recently, phone manufacturers started attending the show to talk with telecom companies and unveil their latest products. Big tech companies, such as Facebook and Amazon, have also had a formal presence in recent years as they have developed important ties with the mobile industry.
According to the World Health Organization, there are more than 43,000 cases of coronavirus around the world. More than 1,000 people have died.
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A list of MWC coronavirus cancellations so far: Facebook, AT&T, Sprint, Intel now also staying away
Yet more big names are being added to the list of companies that are staying away from the world’s biggest mobile tradeshow, Mobile World Congress (MWC), with Facebook and Intel among the latest to cancel their attendance. Due to take place in Barcelona just under two weeks’ time, on February 24-27, the event has been hampered by the ongoing situation with the novel coronavirus outbreak.
“Out of an abundance of caution, Facebook employees won’t be attending this year’s Mobile World Congress due to the evolving public health risks related to coronavirus,” said a spokesperson for Facebook, in a message worded not unlike a number of others that have been put out by others choosing not to attend. “We will continue to collaborate with the GSMA and our partners and thank them for their efforts.”
Spanish publication El Pais is also reporting that the GSMA, the body that organizes the event, is due to meet on Friday and consider its next steps, which could include suspending the event. It also notes that major carriers Vodafone and Deutsche Telekom are also considering options, although nothing has been confirmed yet. Orange has told us it still intends to participate.
We have reached out to the GSMA and it has declined to comment on the El Pais report. “We don’t comment on internal meetings,” the spokesperson said. (The GSMA would be meeting regularly regardless in the lead-up to the event.)
The annual international telco industry event typically attracts more than 100,000 delegates from around 200 countries across the conference’s four days — with every major telco and tech giant exhibiting (with the exception of Apple which prefers its own events).
But with international concern now focused on the novel coronavirus outbreak — which was declared a global emergency by the World Health Organization late last month and as of today has infected over 40,000 people with more than 1,000 deaths — a growing number of companies have announced they are pulling out of attending.
Others, such as Telenor, TCL and ZTE, have cancelled press events or said they will scale back their presence though are still planning to attend. Today Chinese phone maker Xiaomi also confirmed it will attend — tweeting a statement detailing the precautions it’s taking.
Having carriers pulling out of the event is a huge deal, since they are the key “buyers” at the trade show and at the heart of the organization, the GSMA, that is behind it. And while big tech companies like Facebook are a newer, but now very regular, presence the event — which underscores how MWC has changed over the years, and how the mobile industry is trying to evolve with the times, where “tech” and “telco” are no longer distinct entities — they are nonetheless leaving a large hole in the makeup of the show by not being there.
The GSMA has announced a series of restrictions intended to reduce the risk of the coronavirus infections at the conference, including a ban on travellers coming from the province in China where the virus was first identified. It has also said it will implement temperature screening of attendees; require conference-goers self-certify they have not come into contact with an infected person; and is suggesting delegates adopt a ‘no hand shake’ policy in a bid to limit contact.
There is a lot riding on MWC going ahead. The El Pais report notes that MWC generates some 14,000 temporary jobs and generates €492 million (nearly $540 million) for the city. Per the GSMA site, more than 2,400 companies are exhibiting at MWC this year. Yesterday, a spokesperson told TechCrunch that MWC had 2,800 companies signed up to exhibit, but it’s not sharing how many are still going to be there.
See below for a list of companies that have cancelled their attendance at the conference — we’ll update with any additions as we get them.
Organizations that have cancelled their attendance at MWC 2020
ARCEP, France’s FCC (confirmed via email)
AT&T (confirmed via email)
F5 Networks (confirmed via email)
Facebook (confirmed via email)
Gigaset (confirmed via email)
KMW Communications (confirmed via email)
Radwin (confirmed via email)
Rakuten (confirmed via email)
Sprint (confirmed via email)
Viber (confirmed via email)
This article was updated with a correction to remove ‘Rakuten’ from the list of cancellations after an earlier spokesperson provided us with incorrect information. And in a further update, the CEO of Viber, owned by Rakuten, also said the messaging app would be attending after all:
“As of today Viber will have a presence at MWC, including me,” said Djamel Agaoua. “Like all companies, we are evaluating the risk to our employees and if our position changes we will keep you updated. Sorry about the confusion.”
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Daily Crunch: MWC faces coronavirus concerns
The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 9am Pacific, you can subscribe here.
1. As top exhibitors pull out of MWC, organizers implement stringent safeguards
A couple of weeks before the event, the organizers of Mobile World Congress have issued some fairly sweeping safeguards over growing concerns around the coronavirus. After a number of high-profile back-outs, the organizers announced a ban of visitors originating from the Hubei province, whose capital Wuhan is believed to be the origin of the epidemic.
Following this news on Sunday, Sony and Amazon also pulled out of MWC.
2. NASA and ESA’s Solar Orbiter begins its nearly two-year journey to the Sun
After years of development, an exciting new scientific research spacecraft has launched on its journey to study our solar system’s central player: the Sun.
3. Netflix’s movies only won two Oscars this year
Two Oscars — Best Actress in a Supporting Role for Laura Dern’s performance in “Marriage Story” and Best Documentary Feature for “American Factory” — are a respectable showing for a studio that only started making movies a few years ago. Yet it still feels like a disappointment, given Netflix’s 24 nominations and its aggressive Oscar campaigns.
4. Starling Bank raises another £60M from existing backers
Starling Bank, the U.K.-based challenger bank founded by banking veteran Anne Boden, has raised another £60 million from its existing investors, Merian Global Investors and Harry McPike’s JTC. Starling is also disclosing that customers have opened 1.25 million consumer and business accounts since its banking app launched in May 2017.
5. The team behind Apple’s ‘Mythic Quest’ says video games aren’t the punch line
When video game publisher Ubisoft first approached “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” stars Rob McElhenney and Charlie Day about creating a new show set in the game industry, McElhenney said they weren’t interested — at least not initially. But a visit to Ubisoft’s Montreal office changed his mind.
6. Index Fund’s portfolio is driving long-overdue innovation in femcare
We chatted with Index principal Hannah Seal about the fund’s investment in tampon startup Daye and her broader thoughts on a new generation of female-focused startups. (Extra Crunch membership required.)
7. This week’s TechCrunch podcasts
The Equity team has some thoughts about Casper’s IPO, as well as the strong post-IPO performance of One Medical. And over on Original Content, we review Netflix’s Taylor Swift documentary “Miss Americana” — even if you’re not a Swiftie, I think we had a fun conversation about celebrity culture.
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Sony to pull out of MWC over coronavirus outbreak
Japanese electronics firm Sony is the latest phone maker to announce it’s withdrawing from the Mobile World Congress (MWC) tradeshow, citing concerns about the coronavirus outbreak.
“As we place the utmost importance on the safety and wellbeing of our customers, partners, media and employees, we have taken the difficult decision to withdraw from exhibiting and participating at MWC 2020 in Barcelona, Spain,” Sony wrote in a press release.
MWC is due to take place in Barcelona between February 24-27.
Sony said it will now run a press conference planned for the event via its official Xperia YouTube channel at the scheduled time of 8:30 AM (CET) on February 24.
“Sony would like to thank everyone for their understanding and ongoing support during these challenging times,” it added.
In recent days, a number of companies have announced they’re pulling out or scaling back their presence at the conference as a result of concerns about the spread of the virus, including Amazon, Ericsson, LG, NVIDIA and ZTE.
The World Health Organization dubbed the emergence and spread of the novel coronavirus a global emergency late last month.
At the time of writing, the majority of infections and deaths from the virus remain in China, where the virus was first identified in the town of Wuhan in the Hubei province.
Several Chinese tech companies, including ZTE and Xiaomi, have said they will make changes to their participation in MWC related to coronavirus concerns, such as placing limits on staff travelling from China or requiring they self isolate in the period before attending.
Yesterday the organizers of MWC, the GSMA, also announced stringent rules to try to safeguard attendees, including a ban on travellers from Hubei and a requirement that all travellers who have been in China must be able to prove they have been outside the country 14 days prior to the event.
Attendees will also be required to self-certify they have not been in contact with anyone affected, the GSMA said. Temperature screening will also be implemented at the event.
Last year the annual mobile tech conference drew almost 110,000 attendees from 198 countries.
“While further planning is underway, we will continue to monitor the situation and will adapt our plans according to developments and advice we receive. We are contending with a constantly evolving situation, that will require fast adaptability,” the GSMA also said.
Attendance at MWC has regularly broken 100,000 in recent years, but 2020’s conference seems likely to mark a break with business as usual as companies face pressure to rethink their travel priorities.
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As top exhibitors pull out of MWC, organizers implement stringent safeguards
A couple of weeks out, Mobile World Congress organizer, the GSMA, has issued some fairly sweeping safeguards over growing concerns around the coronavirus. After a number of high profile back outs, including ZTE, LG, NVIDIA and Ericsson, the company issued a new list, including a ban of visitors originating from the Hubei province, whose capital Wuhan is believed to be the origin of the epidemic.
Per GSMA CEO John Hoffman,
-
All travelers from the Hubei province will not be permitted access to the event
-
All travelers who have been in China will need to demonstrate proof they have been outside of China 14 days prior to the event (passport stamp, health certificate)
-
Temperature screening will be implemented
-
Attendees will need to self-certify they have not been in contact with anyone infected.
More than 800 people have died from the virus, surpassing the 774 people who were killed by SARS circa 2002-2003. Hoffman adds that the organizer will be increasing a disinfectant program around the site and promoting a “no handshake policy.” As the organization notes, some 5,000-6,000 people from China attend the show each year, accounting for around 5-6 percent of visitors.
The GSMA is clearly interested in addressing concerns over the virus, while limiting further attendee or exhibitor erosion. The release quotes Catalan health minister Alba Vergés, who notes, “The Catalan health system is prepared to detect and treat coronavirus, to give the most appropriate response, and this must be clear to those attending MWC Barcelona.”
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[Updated] LG withdraws from MWC due to coronavirus-related concerns
This story has been edited to reflect a new statement by ZTE that it will attend MWC as planned.
LG Electronics has cancelled its plan to participate in MWC later this month in Barcelona, Spain, because of coronavirus-related concerns, while Xiaomi has cancelled its trip for Chinese media but will still attend the event.
In a statement on its site, LG said it will skip MWC, the world’s largest mobile trade show, and launch this year’s releases at separate events “in the near future” instead.
“With the safety of its employees, partners and customers foremost in mind, LG has decided to withdraw from exhibiting and participating in MWC 2020 later this month in Barcelona, Spain,” the statement from LG, headquartered in Seoul, South Korea, read. “This decision removes the risk of exposing hundreds of LG employees to international travel which has already become more restrictive as the virus continues to spread across borders.”
A Xiaomi spokesperson told TechCrunch the company is “paying close attention to the situation. Xiaomi is still attending this year’s event and will make necessary adjustment accordingly.”
Earlier The Verge reported that ZTE had cancelled its press conference because of travel and visa delays, according to a company spokesperson, but also because “[we] tend to be an overly courteous company, and simply don’t want to make people uncomfortable.” But the company later tweeted that it plans to attend MWC as planned.
#ZTE will participate in #MWC20 Barcelona as planned, showcasing comprehensive #5G end-to-end solutions and a wide variety of 5G devices. ZTE’s booth is in 3F30, Hall 3, FIRA GRAN VIA. pic.twitter.com/vB9S4IpyZP
— ZTE Corporation (@ZTEPress) February 5, 2020
The coronavirus outbreak has disrupted travel and supply chains around the world. While the vast majority of cases reported have been inside China, the outbreak has also led to a wave of open racism and xenophobia targeted at people of Asian descent around the world.
In a statement posted on its site today, MWC organizers GSMA said it “continues to monitor and assess the potential impact of the coronavirus on its MWC20 events held annually in Barcelona, Shanghai and Los Angeles and as well as the Mobile 360 Series of regional conferences. The GSMA confirms that there is minimal impact on the event thus far.”
All Barcelona events taking place February 24 to 27 will go on as scheduled. GSMA previously announced the measures it is taking to prevent the spread of the virus, including increased cleaning and disinfection of high-traffic areas, including catering areas, handrails, bathrooms, entrances and exits and touchscreens and more onsite medical support. It also said it will have a “mic change protocol” for speakers, and advise all attendees to “adopt a ‘no-handshake’ policy.”
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The best of MWC 2019
After years of promises, 5G finally arrived at MWC 2019 — kind of, sort of. Barcelona served as the launching pad for several 5G handsets, set to arrive later this year. Though your actual 5G mileage may vary.
Foldable displays, another long-promised smartphone tech, also had its moment in the sun. Several companies debuted foldables — some were actual handsets with actual price tags, while others fell firmly within the concept camp. And pretty much all of them were behind glass.
Other notable trends for the event included cameras, AR/VR and security of all sorts. Here are the highlights and lowlights from the world’s biggest mobile show. All in all, we’re here for the weirdness.
5G comes of age
It’s been an MWC talking point for years now, but at this week’s show, the first 5G handsets finally arrived.
–Huawei Mate X
–LG V50 ThinQ 5G
–Samsung Galaxy Fold
–Samsung Galaxy S10
–Xiaomi Mi Mix 3
–ZTE Axon 10 Pro 5G
OnePlus, which promised last year that it would be among the first to hop on the 5G train, didn’t have a handset to announce, but it did demo a prototype and announce an initiative for 5G app devs.
Unfolding the future
Time to unfold the checkbook. The first foldables are here, carrying an average price of ~$2,000. That’s like two phones for the price of, well, two phones. Whether or not the phones will be worth it, however, is another question entirely.
–Huawei Mate X
–Samsung Galaxy Fold
TCL showed off a prototype at the show, promising to deliver a more affordable take on the space at some point next year. Oppo, too, is still very much in the prototype phase.
AR/VR/MR
The biggest hit of the world’s biggest phone show may not have been a phone at all. Microsoft used the event to launch the second generation of its HoloLens, a headset firmly focused on business.
–Microsoft HoloLens 2
–Microsoft Azure Kinect
–Vive Focus Plus
–Qualcomm XR chips
Security
Huawei had a lot to say about accusations of security threats around its 5G equipment. Ditto for the European Commission’s digital commissioner. Android, meanwhile, will be getting more password-less logins.
Misc
–Energizer’s 18,000 mAh phone
–Light is expanding from smartphone cameras to self-driving cars
–HTC’s blockchain phone can now be purchased with fiat currency
–Sprint to launch 5G service in 4 cities in May
–Facebook expands its internet infrastructure projects
–New microSD format promises insane transfer speeds, better battery life
–Nubia’s ‘wearable smartphone’ might be the next step for flexible displays
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The Shadow Ghost turns cloud gaming into a seamless experience
French startup Blade, the company behind Shadow, is launching a new set-top box to access its cloud gaming service — the Shadow Ghost. I’ve been playing with the device for a couple of weeks and here’s my review.
The Shadow Ghost is a tiny little box that doesn’t do much. The true magic happens in a data center near your home. When you sign up to Shadow, you don’t even have to get a box. You can simply subscribe to the service without any hardware device and use the company’s apps instead.
Shadow is a cloud computing service for gamers. For $35 per month, you can access a gaming PC in a data center and interact with this computer. Right now, Shadow gives you eight threads on an Intel Xeon 2620 processor, an Nvidia Quadro P5000 GPU that performs more or less as well as an Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080, 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage. You can optionally get more storage with an extra subscription. It’s a full Windows 10 instance and you can do whatever you want with it.
Most subscribers now access Shadow using one of the company’s apps on Windows, macOS or Linux. You also can connect to your virtual machine from your iOS or Android phone or tablet. And now, you can buy the Shadow Ghost if you want to use the service on a TV or without a computer.
I first used Shadow during the early days of the service back in early 2017. My first experience of the service felt like magic. Thanks to my high-speed fiber connection, I could play demanding games on a laptop. The best part was that the laptop fan would remain silent.
But it wasn’t perfect. Nvidia driver updates failed sometimes. Or your virtual machine would become completely unaccessible without some help from the customer support team.
In other words, the concept was great, but the service wasn’t there yet.
Things have changed quite drastically after years of iteration on the apps, the streaming engine, the infrastructure and even the GPUs in the data centers. Blade co-founder and CEO Emmanuel Freund told me that the service has been working fine for just a few months.
It’s no surprise that those technical improvements have led to less churn, more referrals and more subscriptions. In July 2018, the startup had 20,000 subscribers. Now there are 65,000 subscribers. There’s even more demand, but the company has had a hard time keeping up with new machines in data centers.
Shadow is currently available in France, the U.K., Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland and parts of the U.S. The company simply can’t accept customers from anywhere in the world because they need to live near a data center with Shadow servers.
Playing with the Shadow Ghost
The original Shadow box was a bit clunky. You could hear the fan, you had to rely on dongles if you wanted to pair a Bluetooth device or connect to a Wi-Fi network and there was no HDMI port — only DisplayPort. Internally, Blade has been debating whether the company needs another box.
In 2017, it was too hard to explain the product without some sort of physical device — you can replace a PC tower with a tiny box. But now that gamers understand the benefits of cloud gaming, there’s no reason to force you to buy a box.
And yet, the Shadow Ghost can be a useful little device in some cases. For instance, while the company has released an Android TV app and is testing a new app for the Apple TV, your current TV setup might not be compatible with Shadow. Or maybe you primarily use a laptop and you want to create a desktop PC setup with a display, a keyboard, a mouse and a Shadow Ghost.
Everything has been improved. It is now a fanless device that consumes less than 5W when it’s on. It has an Ethernet port, two USB 3.0 ports, two USB 2.0 ports, an audio jack and a single HDMI port. Bluetooth and Wi-Fi have finally been integrated in the device.
When you boot up the device, you get a menu to connect to a Wi-Fi network or control your Bluetooth devices. You also can change some streaming settings, like in the app launcher.
Once you press the start button, the video stream starts and it feels like you’re using a Windows computer. With Steam’s Big Picture mode, you get a convenient setup for couch gaming. I had no issue playing demanding games, such as Hitman 2. It works perfectly fine with a Wi-Fi connection and a Bluetooth controller.
Using the Shadow Ghost feels just like using the Shadow app on a computer. So it’s hard to say whether you need the Shadow Ghost or not. It depends on your setup at home and how you plan to use the service.
Last summer, Blade planned to manufacture 5,000 units. But now that the user base has grown significantly, that first batch could disappear in no time. It is available starting today for $140.
A gold rush
Cloud gaming is a hot space right now. While some companies have been experimenting with this concept for a while (Nvidia, Sony), it feels like everyone is working on a new service of some sort. Maybe the next Xbox is going to be about streaming a game from a data center. Maybe Amazon will offer a game library in the cloud as part of your Amazon Prime subscription.
Emmanuel Freund believes that it could be an opportunity for Shadow. Everybody is going to talk about cloud gaming if Apple and Google announce new services. But the startup has years of experiences in the space and has tried hard to compensate when it comes to latency and internet speeds.
It’s going to be harder to compete on content though. Game publishers and console manufacturers could start releasing exclusive titles on their cloud gaming services. That’s why Blade is thinking about new gaming experiences and exclusive content that would make Shadow more than a technical service.
(Controller for scale)
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