Despite cancelling MWC the GSMA has announced the winners of the 2020 GLOMO awards.
There is some confusion, however, particularly among winners in emerging markets, about when and how their awards will now be presented. Normally this takes place at a ceremony in Barcelona during MWC.
The GSMA has said it is “planning to present the winners with their awards over the next couple of weeks or so in their offices around the world”. However, one Asia based winner we contacted, whose senior management are “ecstatic” about their award, had not heard about this plan or received any communication about their award from the GSMA, more than 24 hours after the announcement. This may reflect some issues within the GSMA as it struggles to deal with the fall-out of the MWC cancellation. Industry rumours of head-count reductions and programme cuts are rife.
This should not, however, be permitted to detract from the immense achievement of winning a GLOMO, the industry’s most prestigious award, for which the writer of this piece is a judge in the emerging markets category. A particularly nice touch this year was the special commendation given in the GLOMOs for the late Bob Collymore. Bob was a veteran of the mobile industry and was instrumental in the rise of mobile banking while CEO of Safaricom in Kenya and promoted the service across Africa.
By our count around half of the winning entries either originate from, are in partnership with an organisation from, or are primarily intended for deployment in emerging markets, which is great news. The categories have been expanded and updated over the 25 years the GLOMOs have existed and it is pleasing to see the powerful influence emerging markets now have on them.
All the winners are to be strongly congratulated. They are:
Category 1: Mobile Technology
1a. Best Mobile Network Infrastructure
- Vodafone, Parallel Wireless and Telecom Infra Project for Global OpenRAN Deployments
1b. Best Mobile Technology Breakthrough (Companies over $10M Annual Global Revenue)
- Ericsson for Ericsson Spectrum Sharing (ESS)
1c. Best Mobile Technology Breakthrough (Companies under $10M Annual Global Revenue)
- KaiOS for KaiOS
1d. Best Network Software Breakthrough (Companies over $10M Annual Global Revenue)
- Parallel Wireless for OpenRAN Controller and Network Software
1e. Best Network Software Breakthrough (Companies under $10M Annual Global Revenue)
- Cohere Technologies for Improved 4G and 5G FDD/TDD Networks
1f. Best Mobile Authentication & Security Solution
- Nuance Communications Inc. for Nuance Gatekeeper
1g. 5G Leadership Award
- Huawei for Gear up with Huawei’s E2E 5G Products
1i. CTO Award
- Ericsson for Ericsson Spectrum Sharing (ESS)
Category 2: Connected Consumer
2a. Best Mobile Operator Service for Consumers
- Vimplecom for Beeline & Liza Alert
2b. Best Mobile Service for the Connected Life
- CalAmp for Here Comes The Bus
2c. Most Innovative Mobile App
- Turkcell for BiP Translate
Category 3: Industry X
3a. Best Mobile Innovation for Work
- China Eastern Airlines, China Unicom & Huawei for 5G Smart Travel in Airport
3b. Best Mobile Innovation for Health and Biotech
- Flare for Flare
3c. Best Mobile Innovation for Automotive
- SK Telecom for Smart Fleet: Data Analytics Platform for Intelligent Mobility
3d. Best Mobile Innovation for Payment and Fintech
- Juvo for Financial Identity as a Service (FiDaaS)
3e. Best Mobile Innovation for Smart Cities
- China Mobile (Zhejiang) and Huawei for NB-IoT Smart City Fire Control
3f. Best Mobile Innovation for Media and Entertainment
- LG Uplus for U+VR 5G
3g. Best Mobile Innovation for Building Trust in the Digital Age
- Samsung Electronics for Knox Security Platform
3h. Tech of the Future Award
- Huawei for Atlas 900 AI Cluster - The Pinnacle of AI Compute for Future Inclusion
Category 4: Device
4a. Best Smartphone
- OnePlus 7T Pro
4b: Disruptive Device Innovation
- Qualcomm X5X 5G platforms
4d. Best Connected Consumer Device
- Vasco Electronics for Vasco Mini2
Category 5: Tech4Good
5a. Best Mobile Innovation for Emerging Markets
- Safaricom for DigiFarm
5b. Best Mobile Innovation supporting Emergency or Humanitarian Situations
- Mapswipe for MapSwipe
5c. Best Use of Mobile for Accessibility & Inclusion
- SK Telecom for Driving Assistance Solution for hearing-impaired taxi driver
5d. Best Mobile Innovation for Climate Action
- Huawei for Huawei PowerStar™ Solution, 3-Level AI-Based Energy Saving solution to provide end-to-end Network Energy Saving
5e. Best Mobile Innovation for Enhancing Children’s Lives
- Accenture for SAATHI – Autism Therapy at your Fingertips.
5f. Outstanding Mobile Contribution to the UN SDGs
- KT for Global Epidemic Prevention Platform
Category 6: Government Leadership Award
- The Government of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
Category 7: Outstanding Achievement
7a. Outstanding Contribution to the Mobile Industry
- Safaricom
7b. Women4Tech – Industry Leadership Award
- Elena Sinel, Founder for Teens In AI
7c. Diversity in Tech Award
- Teens In AI for Teens In AI
7d. 25 Years of Connecting People Award
- Dr Mike Short
Category 9: YoMo STEAM Activity for Young People Award
9a. YoMo STEAM Activity for Young People Award
- SK Telecom for Happy Coding School for Adolescents with Special Needs
