From robots to mobile phones: AI takes over the technology sector

The Mobile World Congress held this week in Barcelona comes to an end. And it does so with a bittersweet flavor. On the one hand, very good attendance and exhibitor figures. But on the other hand, the mobile phone fair has fewer and fewer mobile phones and instead artificial intelligence fills the halls with all kinds of equipment to attract visitors. But this technology that everyone is talking about at the moment has limited day-to-day applications.

During these days of the fair, two groups of devices have been seen, all of them with AI as their last name. On the one hand, those that exploit this technology the most and that in turn are the most striking, but at the moment they are gadgets that we are unlikely to use. And on the other hand, those that are already reaching stores and are beginning to introduce this technology little by little, in a less spectacular way.

In the first group are equipment such as the robot from the British company Engineered Arts, Ameca. With a humanoid appearance, the most striking thing about this robot equipped with AI is that it can interact and even reason with humans in a very natural way thanks to the use of OpenAi's GPT-4 and express itself with its hands and facial features. . At the moment, this humanoid is designed to attract attention at fairs like the MWC, without it being a device that makes sense on a particular level.

Another device that attracts attention and that will go on sale in March in the United States is the Ai Pin, a kind of technological brooch to wear on the lapel of your jacket and leave the phone at home. Or that's what its creators, Humane, are looking for. This small equipment was also seen in the hallways of the MWC but its use is not entirely convincing. According to what they say, the idea is to always carry it with you and use it as an assistant with whom you can communicate using voice commands and a lot of artificial intelligence. And if you need to visualize something, you can project it onto the palm of your hand.

Technology that attracts attention for a small device that will be sold for $700 in the United States with the aim of displacing the mobile phone.

Also wanting to change the use of traditional mobile phones, the operator Deutsche Telekom presented at the fair a prototype of a phone powered by artificial intelligence in which there are no applications as such, nor the app store, but rather the user asks the terminal for what he wants and he manages it instantly, without having to enter specific platforms.

One more idea of ​​how to take advantage of AI but for now it remains just that, an idea, since there is no forecast for it to go on sale.

In the second group, that of manufacturers that already boast of taking advantage of artificial intelligence and that already have devices with AI in their portfolio, Honor, Samsung or Lenovo were some of the most relevant companies.

Honor presented the new Magic 6 Pro, a very powerful high-end phone in which the Chinese company debuts its first generative AI functions thanks to a large model of its own language and the help of Meta. This terminal will gradually incorporate functions through updates, since at the moment almost the entire AI section is left to the camera.

In the case of Samsung, the company has been one of the first to launch a phone with generative AI functions, the Galaxy S24, and now wants to extend this technology to more devices. During the MWC, at the Korean stand you could test the three new Galaxy Book4 series laptops whose strong point is the new Intel Core Ultra 9/7 processor and an NPU in a single device that will allow the team to enhance these functions. AI.

For its part, Lenovo also announced new laptops with AI, in this case very focused on the business sector. The new Thinkpad and Thinkbook use artificial intelligence to improve security, energy efficiency and experience when using the device.