GLOMOs poised for milestone edition
By Chris Donkin
The Global Mobile Awards, or GLOMOs as they are better known, is always a highlight of MWC Barcelona and has become a tracker of cutting-edge innovation and initiatives related to the mobile industry since its formation as the GSM Awards in 1996. To mark the 30th edition being held at MWC25, we look back at the evolution of the awards and some of the major highlights from GLOMOs gone by.
The inaugural honours were awarded in Cannes at GSM World Congress, the forerunner to MWC. The ceremony stayed on the French Riviera until the 2006 edition when it moved to National Palace at Montjuic, Barcelona, before settling in its current home of Fira Gran Via.
Today 33 awards are handed out across seven different categories. This represents a huge expansion from the original handful of prizes recognising technical innovation, the top GSM handset, customer growth in several regions and a special chairman’s award.
Its growth mirrors the increased scope and influence of the mobile industry over those years.
Mark Smith, former marketing and communications director at the GSMA and the man who launched and managed the growth of the awards alongside other GSMA initiatives over two decades, explained early editions were designed to “promote the global adoption of the GSM standard and consumer take up”.
“It was also a platform of recognition for big technology advances within the industry – initially devices and then network and infrastructure innovation,” he added.
Mike Short, GSMA chairman at the launch of the awards, is credited with the idea though Smith noted this was “pretty much on the eve of the show in Cannes in 1996, so we didn’t have much time to make that first one happen!”
Short told Insight part of the thinking was around the fact the organisation “wanted to mark that we were on the journey from 10 million [GSM] customers globally to 100 million”.
The initial aim, he explained, was to share knowledge internationally and highlight “those growing fastest,” alongside innovation bringing value to the nascent ecosystem and novel ideas making waves.
“Back in 1996 GSM coverage was still largely in Europe and we wanted to make sure that some of the [success] stories would spread into Asia, into the Arab states and also into North America,” Short added.
MAJOR INNOVATIONS
Over the years the GLOMOs expanded to cover a broad number of areas, and reading through the list of winners is like a highlights reel of technologies and initiatives key to driving adoption of mobile technology by the masses.
In terms of consumer devices, back in 1996 the cutting-edge Nokia 2110i scooped the outstanding GSM handset prize. The winner of the equivalent prize last year (best smartphone) was the Google Pixel 8 Series. A comparison between the features and technology within the two illustrates just how far device technology has advanced in that time.
Within this segment Short noted the “amazing journey” of the mobile camera phone, highlighted by various GLOMOs over the years.
“25 years ago we had no mobile camera phones and today we wouldn’t have social media without it,” he added.
The advent of the smartphone was credited by Smith as causing “an explosion of innovative new enterprise and consumer applications and services, fuelled by a burgeoning global app ecosystem.
“From that point on there was a marked uplift in demand for new categories in the GLOMOs that was really hard to contain. Especially as we needed awards to recognise innovation not just in the market, but for the industry’s support of many new GSMA initiatives”.
STAR-STUDDED CEREMONIES
As the awards grew so did the ceremony, with famous faces making appearances as presenters or guests.
This included musical performances from acts including Duran Duran, Will.i.am and Craig David.
Big name hosts included Joanna Lumley, Clive Anderson, Graham Norton, Stephen Fry, Jonathan Ross, John Cleese and James Corden.
Alongside fronting the awards ceremony in 2014 Corden is credited with coming up with the GLOMOs moniker still used today.
Smith said the name “came over dinner the night before the awards in Barcelona in 2014,” with the comedian suddenly announcing “from here on we should call them the GLOMOs”.
Having also declared this idea for the suggested rename on stage, the new brand stuck and was formally adopted the following year.
A number of these celebrity guests used their appearances to showcase their love for innovations of the day.
Smith noted Fry was “the most passionate about the technology and mobile, by some way,” while Australian comedian Tim Minchin’s performance of a song about his beloved Nokia 3310 was another highlight cited.
Despite boasting international celebrity guests over the years, the real highlight each year is in recognising advances creating real societal change.
Short noted the “reaction from some of the winners who perhaps have been engineering for years-and- years or promoting a technology and business development was absolutely stunning.
“Their enthusiasm from the stage was palpable. You could see how that would energise so many others and, in fact, it led to some companies saying: well, I might have done this really well in country one, but why don’t I do this in country two, three, four and five.”
Current GLOMOs chair of judges and executive chairman of CCS Insight Shaun Collins highlighted the impressive quality and diversity of entrants over the years, “from profoundly technical network solutions pushing the edge of our industry forwards to small applications aimed at making the lives of the under-served in the world better, healthier and more positive”.
He also highlighted the “quality, independence, and dedication of the judges”.
“This dedicated group has been the heartbeat of the programme, and they deserve much credit for GLOMOs becoming the most important awards programme in the industry,” Collins added.
STAND-OUTS
Smith stated there had been “some astonishing winners over the last 30 years”.
“Among the ones that really stand out were those early pioneers of financial services, especially in emerging markets, long before paying by mobile and sending money to friends was available in Western markets”.
These include Smart Money launched in 2000 in the Philippines and “outstanding mobile money services later in the same decade,” Smith added. “These services truly set the benchmark for every country to subsequently follow”.
Elsewhere he highlighted those that recognised “the impact and massive potential of mobile deployments in emergency situations and humanitarian disasters”.
“From earthquakes, tsunamis and conflicts, refugee crises, flooding and famine, the power of mobile to support humanity in desperate times has really been phenomenal in the last twenty years or so,” with the awards recognising much innovation in this area.
Meanwhile, Collins stated “winners that change lives and save lives always leave a lasting impact,” picking out the 2018 SDG award winner EWATERpay, a low-cost technical solution providing sustainable access to water, and a GLOMO awarded to Kyiv Municipality last year for its Digital Life-Saving App.
In another example of developments with lasting impact, Short highlighted the “immense work done to do with mobile internet and helping access to the internet globally”.
Smith noted that, like MWC itself, “the awards have grown to be a critical platform to promote and recognise the positive impact of game changing digital technology, applications and services across every industry and every facet of life.
“Back in 1996, it was the stuff of science fiction that we would one day send video over the air, so to have seen and awarded some of the astonishing achievements we have through the GLOMOs over the last 30 years should be an immense source of pride for everyone that has been involved in the development and success of 2G, 3G, 4G and 5G.”
Discussing the reasons for the longevity of the awards, Short said it was partly down to the fact they have “adapted over time so it was never just for operators. It was never just for regulators. It was never just for manufacturers. It was meant to be an inclusive industry growth curve that we could promote and support.
“So the fact we’ve refreshed the awards many times over has really helped because the technology was moving faster than the awards in some years,” he added.
Collins explained today the “GLOMOs have become one of the most popular sessions at the show [MWC], with 600 or 700 people present for the in-person event,” adding the “shortlist announcement is one of Mobile World Live’s most-watched events as it celebrates the best of our industry at the most critical show in the industry diary”.