Vodafone CeBIT 2017
Giga. Show. Cases. At the world’s largest exhibition for digital business, anyone wanting to stand out from the crowd has to have one thing: a ‘giga’ presence.
Not a problem for Vodafone. Nor for Service Factory, which showed off its strength at CeBIT 2017: from the structural realisation of the design concept and the complete branding through to the planning of special events such as a press conference, employee kick-off, a visit from the chancellor and a party at the stand. By the time the festivities got started, a total of 54 showcases with 35 partners were on display for the audience’s wonderment. And the motto said it all: ‘Welcome to Germany’s giganetwork. Your business is at home here.’
The most important highlights:
Infrastructure in space – controlled by Vodafone.
Head of Vodafone Hannes Ametsreiter unveiled two sensations at CeBIT: the first German moon landing is scheduled for 2018. And Vodafone will be providing the first LTE network in space – controlled by the mission control centre in Berlin. What do we get from this? Amazingly sharp HD images of the moon – the first ones in over 45 years. And a stable solar-powered LTE network for all subsequent moon missions.
Giga City Experience – the city of the future.
Smart mobility, smart waste management, smart lighting in an urban setting – in other words, the city is getting smarter. Using Microsoft HoloLens smart glasses, each scenario could be selected and projected to a model city in order to learn more about the technologies and services provided by Vodafone. Additionally, using augmented reality, textures and 3D objects could be added to the Giga City – to the obvious fascination of Chancellor Angela Merkel and Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
5G connected cars – automated driving in the Giga Car.
As part of a spectacular multisensory experience, exhibition visitors could be part of a world without car accidents, traffic lights and driving stress. Using LTE 4.5 and 5G mobile data connectivity, the Vodafone Giga Car demonstrated just how easy, fast and stress-free automated driving can be during a tour through various virtual-reality scenarios.
5G robots – real-time networking of the future.
As the future standard of mobile data, 5G enables the instant exchange of enormous amounts of data, thereby creating areas of application for robots in industry and everyday life. As such, the interaction between human and machine is becoming much more important. The best example of this was Pepper, a humanoid robot that had conversations with visitors to the exhibition.
Walking robot Ekso GT – IoT and cloud applications in medicine.
Walking – despite loss of ability to walk or even paraplegia? It may sound like a miracle, but visitors to the exhibition experienced it thanks to Ekso GT, a type of suit which helps patients relearn proper walking technique by imitating a natural walk. Via SIM card, data about the movements is read and stored in the cloud via mobile data connection for the purpose of therapy observation and adjustment.
3D avatars by dooblicater – dooblicate yourself!
Looking for a doppelgänger? DOOBLICATOR, the world’s first mobile 3D photogrammetric scanner, made its global debut. The contactless system scans the human body in a mere 0.01 seconds and transforms the data from the scan into a physical 3D model and/or a digital avatar which, via Vodafone cloud solution, goes online immediately.
Making future technologies like these and many more a palpable experience for a broad audience at the exhibition is an extreme challenge. The type of challenge that also comes with extreme conditions – for example for project managers. According to pedometers, they took an average of 30,000 steps per day, which led directly to a first-class brand experience.
‘I would like to give heartfelt thanks to all for the great work – not only at this year’s CeBIT, but also at all the other events.
It was a true joy to work with such a great team of professionals. And I am proud of how the events, which have always been put on at a very high level, have developed each year. Thank you very, very much for the outstanding time!’