Well, it’s that time of the year again and MWC 2016 is almost upon us. In the wake the mobile world’s biggest and most important event, we decided it would be fun to take a look back in time to MWC 2006 (called 3GSM world congress back then). Partially to reminisce about the history of mobile tech, but also to try and get a better perspective on just how far we have come in 10 years.

It might not be regarded as that long in historical terms but a decade, especially the last one, seems like a millennium in tech innovation. Despite the rapid pace of change, the MWC conference was already around for a few years in 2006 and it was just as important as it is today, perhaps even more so.

Originally called the GSM World Congress, back then it was referred to as 3GSM World Congress, which became the Mobile World Congress, now simply called MWC. 2006 was the first year the show took place in Barcelona, which has been its home since. Prior to that, Cannes was the preferred location, so the 2006 show was definitely marked by some transition turbulence.

Still, the spirit of innovation was just as strong and announcements were plentiful. So, without further ado, let’s take a look at some of the highlights of the show in no particular order.

Sony Ericsson

Sony Ericsson was a big player back in 2006 with many dedicated fans and some of the hottest tech around. The K610 was definitely a star attraction. At the time it was actually one of the smallest 3G phones on the market and getting the significantly faster network connection was a top upgrade priority for both manufacturers and users at the time. In a lot of ways, the K610 took inspiration from the 2004 Sony Ericsson K700 – one of the company’s signature devices.

Sony Ericsson K610

Upgrades were introduced all around, besides the aforementioned 3G, the display got bigger at 1.9″, had a resolution of 176 x 220 pixels and was a lot more colorful with 256K color support. The camera was significantly better – a 2MP shooter, rather than a VGA one and there was even a secondary VGA camera for video calls, which were becoming trendy at that point. Another important aspect is storage, the K610 supports Sony’s proprietary M2 micro cards for up to 2GB extra – a whopping amount at that point.

Sony Ericsson W950

Sony Ericsson W810

The 2006 show saw the introduction of a couple of Walkman phones too – the W810 and the W950, the latter being a true flagship offer. It had everything going for it – a huge 2.6″ 256K display with a resolution of 240×320 pixels, 3G, a powerful 208 MHz processor, 4GB of storage and last, but not least, it was a true smartphone, thanks to Symbian OS 9.1.

Sony Ericsson P990

But speaking of a huge display and productivity, few could match Sony Ericsson’s “P” series. You might remember these models by their chubby and really extravagant appearance with a touch screen and a hinged overlay keyboard. The design was bold and innovative and in a lot of ways really emphasized how much more diversified phones were back in the day, as opposed to today’s “slate” design.

But there were other far more extravagant offers out there, which we will get to later. The P990, which was the last and very best to use this form factor, was all about productivity with a 2.7″ resistive touchscreen, 64MB of RAM and a 208MHz processor, among other things.

Samsung

Speaking of alternative design, Samsung, like many other OEMs was constantly experimenting with radical new concepts to slip in between the large number of bar and flip phones. Few are more radical than the Samsung Serene, featured at the 2006 MWC show.

It was a collaboration between Samsung Electronics and Bang & Olufsen and technically came out in 2005, although very few people have actually seen it in person. It is an eccentric piece of tech, with a ludicrous price tag of about €1000 at launch, but the very fact that it exists, proves our point about the freedom for design experimentation.

Samsung Serene

While we are on to topic of alternative concepts, there are the Samsung P900 and P910. Their standout feature was built-in T-DMB or DVB-H tuner for TV watching on the go and a rotating screen to go with it for a better viewing experience.

Samsung P900

Samsung…

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