A few weeks before the biggest mobile industry exhibition, the Mobile World Congress 2020, many big names including LG, Amazon, Ericsson and Sony have announced that they would be skipping the event.

LG was the first to announce earlier this month that it will not attend the event this year due to coronavirus-related concerns. Phonemaker Ericsson, graphics giant Nvidia and tech giant Amazon soon followed suit.

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Nvidia was also a major sponsor for the event.

LG and Ericsson will be hosting a separate event later this year to release their flagship devices.

Sony also announced on Monday that it will be withdrawing from the event. The company will be launch its new products on YouTube, according to an official statement.

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Facebook, too, confirmed its absence from the event on Tuesday, according to a TechCrunch report.

Intel, Vivo, MediaTek, AT&T  and Cisco are the latest to pull back from the event according to the public statements released by the companies.

Tech giants ZTE and TCL, however, declared their intent to go ahead with the event while skipping the press conference scheduled for February 22, GSMArena reported.

Additional safety measures

MWC organiser GSMA had released a statement on February 9 stating that it will be going ahead with the event as planned, with additional safety measures in place in light of the coronavirus outbreak.

“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,” it said.

The event has barred all attendees from the Hubei province in China, the epicentre of the outbreak. Furthermore, attendees with travel history to China will have to provide proof that they have been outside of China for 14 days prior to the event, and present their passport stamp and a health certificate.

Attendees will also need to self-certify that they have not been in contact with an infected person, the organisers said in a statement.

The GSMA is reportedly arranging a meeting on Friday to discuss its next steps in light of major exhibitors pulling out of the event due to health and safety concerns, Spanish publication El Pais reported.

The outbreak of the novel coronavirus, which has now officially been named “COVID-19” by the World Health Organization (WHO) at a conference in Geneva, has claimed over 1,100 lives worldwide. More than 44,600 cases have been confirmed, according to recent media reports.

The MCW 2020 event is scheduled to be held in Barcelona from February 24-27.

List of dropouts

Here’s a complete list of exhibitors who have pulled out of the event due to the outbreak, based on media reports and public statements released by the companies:

  • Accedian
  • Amazon
  • Amdocs
  • AppsFlyer
  • ARCEP, France’s FCC
  • AT&T
  • Ciena
  • Cisco
  • CommScope
  • Dali Wireless
  • Ericsson
  • F5 Networks
  • Facebook
  • Gigaset
  • iconectiv
  • Intel
  • InterDigital
  • Interop Technologies
  • KMW Communications
  • LG
  • MediaTek
  • NTT Docomo
  • Nvidia
  • Radwin
  • Royole Corporation
  • Sony
  • Spirent
  • Sprint
  • Ulefone
  • Umidigi
  • Vivo
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