Value in motion and the moment AI became operational: 5 themes to carry forward to MWC27

Mobile World Congress (MWC) has felt like a three-part story arc. MWC24 was the arrival of AI: bold visions, plenty of excitement, limited real deployment. MWC25 brought the pilot phase: proofs of concept everywhere and early deployments across the stack. MWC26 is where it clicked into something more durable: AI is now being embedded across RAN, core, transport and OSS/BSS, and the conversation has shifted from what’s possible to what’s proven — and how to scale it.  

That’s also why the headline this year was more than “AI everywhere.” It was AI becoming operational — and, in the best sense, starting to feel normal. When a technology becomes dependable, governed and repeatable, it stops being a novelty and becomes infrastructure. And infrastructure is where value compounds.  

PwC went into Barcelona with a narrative built for exactly that moment: Value in Motion and connected ecosystems — because the biggest growth and margin pools are moving across traditional sector boundaries, and winners will be those who can assemble end-to-end ecosystems that deliver outcomes at scale.

That ecosystem lens is also consistent with the economic “pressure and opportunity” described in PwC’s Global Telecom Outlook (2025–2029): traffic continues to soar while ARPU stays flat-to-down, AI and data centres are driving an infrastructure investment super-cycle, and operators are increasingly pushed toward simpler “puretone” portfolio models and AI-native operations (“TelcOS”).

Two additional quiet signals cut through this year. First, power: AI-native operations are starting to hit energy ceilings, pushing telcos toward an energy orchestration mindset—optimising where workloads run, how networks are tuned, and how sites are powered across a distributed footprint. Second, sovereignty is no longer just a cloud conversation; it’s creeping toward the edge and device experience as operators look for ways to keep data and voice processing within jurisdictional guardrails.

A line from the week captured the mood perfectly. As Adolfo Rodero Cosano, TMT  Partner with PwC Spain, put it: “AI is no longer a theme at Mobile World Congress. It is the storyline.”  

On the floor, that point of view showed up in how conversations kept crossing sector lines — less “telecom talking to telecom,” more “telecom as connective infrastructure for the next wave of industry transformation.” In one reflection, Chady Smayra, EMEA TMT Leader with PwC’s Strategy& Middle East,  captured the shift crisply: “This year’s conversations went well beyond traditional industry boundaries… the focus is increasingly on ecosystems, horizontal platforms, and the cross-industry convergence that will shape the next decade of growth.”  

Highlights from PwC’s MWC26 programming 

PwC’s programming was designed to turn that ecosystem story into an execution agenda — applied AI, infrastructure and investment, and the human side of reinvention. 

PwC on the GSMA agenda: pressure-testing the convergence story in public 

Rather than list panels like a conference programme, here’s how PwC’s GSMA-stage presence connected — and why it mattered. As reflected in PwC’s activation plan and the official session listings, PwC leaders moderated five agenda sessions that map neatly to the “connect and compute” story: convergence, monetisation, edge, NTN, and how people actually communicate and connect in a mobile-first world. 

The convergence discussion, moderated by Nicki Wakefield, PwC UK’s Global Clients & Industries Leader, brought together Durga Malladi (Qualcomm), Philip Skipper (Vodafone), Ricardo Lopez-Barquilla (Meta), Fei Fang (Honor), Philippe Lucas (Orange) and Carla Gómez Cano (THEKER Robotics). The through-line was clear: AI is no longer an app layered on top of connectivity — it is reshaping the relationship between device, network and cloud in real time. 

The monetisation debate, moderated by Pierre Bosquet, Strategy& France’s TMT, Data and AI Leader,  included Yoann Bersihand (Schneider Electric), Jean Lawrence (Nokia), Usman Javaid (Orange Business) and Rebecca Smith (Ciena). The most interesting part wasn’t whether AI creates value — it was whether telcos can package it as differentiated outcomes in B2B. 

The edge AI conversation, moderated by PwC’s Global Advisory Clients, Industries & Markets Leader, Jeanette Calandra,  brought together Cristina Rodriguez (Intel), Muninder Singh Sambi (Google), Natalya Lopareva (Algorized) and Azita Arvani (Arvani Group). Here, the message was practical: latency, reliability and distributed orchestration are no longer theoretical design goals — they’re the conditions for real-world deployment. 

The “everywhere connected” session, moderated by Lori Driscoll, PwC’s Global TMT Advisory Leader,  featured Adel Al-Saleh (SES), Oleksandr Komarov (Kyivstar), Stephen Oh (XM2 Group) and Amina Boubendir (Airbus). The tone was refreshingly pragmatic: less futurism, more integration, regulation, and operational reality. 

And finally, a session on digital micro-moments — moderated by PwC’s Global Chief AI Officer, Joe Atkinson — brought in Elizabeth Sarah Horn (Pinterest), Aamir Ibrahim (Jazz), Benjamin Feuerstein (Snap) and Christina Miller (VML). It served as a reminder that even as AI transforms infrastructure, connection remains deeply human. 

What also stood out in Barcelona was how consistently the wider partner ecosystem was converging on similar “operational AI” building blocks—platform layers, governance, agents, and production-grade integration. Microsoft leaned into being the telco AI platform layer (data + AI + governance, with Fabric prominent) rather than simply “more cloud.” Google doubled down on agents inside network operations, reinforcing the shift toward AI-native operations. Salesforce pushed telco-shaped agentic workflows (Agentforce for Communications) aimed at cost-to-serve and experience outcomes. AWS, often through partners, showed up as the production stack underneath those ambitions—where orchestration, security and scale get real.

Spotlight: Capital in Motion — the infrastructure lunch where “boring” became investable 

If there was one moment that captured “AI is becoming infrastructure,” it was the Capital in Motion: Financing the Next Wave of Digital Infrastructure lunch. The discussion moved decisively beyond technology into capital formation, investor appetite, regulatory posture and geopolitical alignment. 

The panel brought together Christine Knackfuß-Nikolic (T-Systems), Nicolas Mahler (Vantage Towers), Steven Sonnenstein (DigitalBridge) and moderator Peter Weichsel, Digital Infrastructure CoE Leader from PwC’s Strategy& Germany, with the conversation centred on the economics of what gets built, where, and how quickly.

CB Velayuthan (formerly Digital Connexion) brought a data centre operator’s view and a simple, useful spotlight: India as a digital infrastructure development hotbed, where demand growth and build momentum are converging quickly. 

Closed-door leadership roundtables — deepening the execution agenda 

Three closed-door roundtables reinforced the public themes with practical depth. 

One focused on preventing AI from becoming the next enterprise tech debt — a conversation led by Joe Atkinson; Quinton Pienaar, PwC UK’s EMEA Customer Transformation Leader; and Fred Brown, PwC US’s TMT Agentic AI Leader. The emphasis was clear: scale responsibly, avoid agent sprawl, and build governance in from the start. 

A second explored digital infrastructure investments in an increasingly uncertain geopolitical landscape. Hosted by Peter Weichsel, it examined value shifts across fibre, towers and edge — the “puretone” infrastructure plays that continue to attract investor focus and demand portfolio clarity. 

A third went directly at B2B growth in AI infrastructure — sovereign and non-sovereign — and how telcos move up the stack into integrated solutions. Hosted by Vinish Bawa, PwC India’s Telecoms Sector Leader,  alongside Dr. Florian Groene, Strategy&’s Global Telecommunications Practice Leader,  and Lori Driscoll, it focused on turning AI infrastructure into industry-specific propositions rather than remaining at the connectivity layer. 

Five takeaways to carry forward 

1) AI with outcomes is the new baseline — and TelcOS is how it becomes real 

The most important shift from MWC26 was not technological — it was behavioural. AI is no longer being debated; it’s being operationalised. 

As Chase Bice, PwC US’s Telecommunications Sector Leader, reflected: “Last year AI dominated the conversation, but much of it was still emerging. This year, what I’m hearing is AI with outcomes.” 

That “outcomes” lens is also where TelcOS stops being a label and becomes an operating model. Florian Groene’s shorthand—TelcOS and agentic-native operations as the “next normal”—landed because it describes the real milestone: AI becoming dependable enough to fade into the background. Not less important; more usable. 

Partner messaging reinforced the same “operating layer” shift. Microsoft’s unified platform story, Google’s agentic-network push, Salesforce’s telco-shaped agents, and AWS’s production-grade foundations were all different routes to the same destination: repeatable outcomes, not isolated experiments. 

2) Humans in the loop — and in the lead — is a strategic advantage 

Transformation at this scale demands cultural alignment. In reflections from a private dinner with software and digital infrastructure leaders, Louise King, TMT Leader, PwC Australia, emphasised the importance of “keeping humans not only in the loop but in the lead with AI.” 

The Sisu discussion — featuring Iris Meijer (Verizon) — reinforced the same principle: resilience, integrity and practical optimism are not abstract leadership traits; they’re prerequisites for scaling AI responsibly in complex organisations. 

3) AI infrastructure, geopolitics and sovereignty are converging — and it’s reaching the edge 

MWC26 underscored how sovereignty is becoming embedded in infrastructure strategy. Initiatives like EURO-3C signal how federated Telco–Edge–Cloud architectures are moving closer to procurement reality in Europe. 

As Oliver Koderman, PwC Canada’s Telecoms Leader,  put it, “sovereignty isn’t staying in the cloud layer.” One show-floor illustration was Deutsche Telekom’s Magenta presence—showing an app-free, network-embedded call assistant—hinting at where this goes next: sovereignty-aware services where data and voice are processed matters, not just what the AI can do.

4) Physical AI is the next horizon for growth — still maturing, but shaping strategy now 

Physical AI drew attention across the show floor. But the strategic insight is less about spectacle and more about direction. Intelligence is moving closer to the moment of action — and that reshapes IoT economics and solution design.  

Jeanette Calandra’s framing — edge AI as “a frontline reality” — captures the operational shift. The opportunity lies in building integrated, outcome-based solutions that combine device, connectivity, edge compute and security. 

Physical AI is still maturing. But it is maturing fast enough to inform today’s investment and partnership decisions — especially for leaders thinking about who owns the end-to-end solution stack. 

5) “Everywhere connected” is the new default — and 6G isn’t required to monetise it 

Hybrid terrestrial and non-terrestrial connectivity is no longer theoretical. It is becoming architected capability. 

PwC partner perspectives noted that while 6G remained visible, it is likely secondary while operators focus on extracting value from 5G Advanced. The key insight: scaling and monetising today’s resilience and reach use cases does not depend on waiting for the next generation. 

The opportunity is integration, packaging and assurance — not simply spectrum and speed. 

What to watch — and what to do — before MWC27 

Watch who industrialises TelcOS at scale, how sovereignty initiatives translate into procurement, where capital flows into fibre, towers and edge, and which operators productise hybird connectivity credibly. And keep one eye on the energy constraint: as AI-native operations push more compute into more places, the operators that can treat energy as an orchestrated resource—not a fixed cost—may quietly build advantage. 

Execute on five fronts: operationalise AI in a handful of high-impact workflows; embed human-plus-agent governance; align infrastructure strategy with sovereignty and investor logic; move up the solution stack in B2B AI infrastructure; and treat physical AI as a horizon to prepare for, not hype to chase. 

MWC27 will bring new headlines. The real differentiator will be who turns operational AI, sovereign-aware infrastructure and connected ecosystems into repeatable, investable growth.