See what 3 HKBNers saw in : Mobile World Congress 2019

Eric Ho Co-Owner & Chief Information Officer Ben Yeung Co-Owner & Head of Business Development & Partnership William Kwan Co-Owner & Associate Director – Network Design & Construction Executive Profile

Eric Ho Co-Owner & Chief Information Officer Joined HKBN Group in July 2012 and is responsible for the Group’s information technology strategy development and leads the IT Department to optimise business support and processes through IT system development, integration and management. Prior to joining HKBN, Mr. Ho was the Head of IT and Service Platform at SmarTone Mobile Communications Limited, and before that, he held senior IT positions at Software Technology, Emperor International Holdings, Westpac, CSL and Bank of America. Mr. Ho was awarded CIO of the Year (Medium Enterprise) jointly conferred by Computerworld Hong Kong and CIO Connect in 2013. Mr. Ho holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Science from the University of Hong Kong, a Master's Degree in Business Administration Degree from Oklahoma City University, U.S., and a Master's in Accountancy Degree from Charles Sturt University, Australia. Ben Yeung Co-Owner & Head of Business Development & Partnership Joined HKBN Group in Jan 2017 and is responsible for developing the company's new business and partnerships, with focus on Mobile (MVNO) Services and OTT content services. Prior to joining HKBN, he was the General Manager of Roaming and International Operator Relationships at SmarTone. He was also the Chairman of GSMA Asia Pacific RIG in 2016. He holds a Bachelor's Degree on Electronics and Executive MBA Degree. William Kwan Co-Owner & Associate Director – Network Design & Construction Joined since July 1999, William is responsible for HKBN’s fibre network strategy including the deployment of fibre optic infrastructure products, the GIS Fibre Management System in 2011 and the Optical Network Monitoring System in 2014, which earned a SAG Award (Special Achievement in GIS). Currently, William oversees all units responsible for delivering network coverage expansion as well as corporate tender business. He also leads IoT projects for Enterprise Solutions. William holds a Bachelor's Degree with Honours in Computer System Engineering, a Postgraduate Diploma in Computer and Information Networks and a Master's Degree in Technology Management. He is currently a committee member for the Join Utilities Policy Group (JUPG) and Hong Kong Internet of Things Alliance etc. Mobile World Congress in Barcelona Over 100,000 Attendants 2,400 Leading companies

The biggest telecom event !

4 Eric Ho’s Pre-trip reflection

• I have attended the MWC on several occasions in Barcelona, Shanghai and Hong Kong. Barcelona's event is the biggest in the world in terms of size and comprehensiveness. If there is only one event you want to attend in the telecom industry, this should be the one. • In 2009, (handset) decided not to participate in MWC as they thought they were big enough and did not need MWC to promote their products. Huawei was then lucky enough to occupy a huge space that was previously reserved for Nokia; seizing the opportunity to showcase its products to operators from all over the world. From that point onward, Nokia continued to decline while Huawei expanded rapidly to eventually become the world's biggest telecom equipment provider. This year, Nokia has returned to MWC. I’m eager to see what they plan to do. • With over 2,400 exhibitors, I would like to grasp:- • the major trends affecting the telecom industry • new products and innovative services • new ways for telecom IT • Ideas and inspirations from other operators

5 Post-trip Reflection (Eric Ho) “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” Charles Dickins This phrase circled my mind over the 4 days I attended Mobile World Congress 2019. For the past 6 years with HKBN, this was the 3rd time I attended an overseas conference. It was stressful yet it has given me some answers to a number of questions.

Salesforce I was able to attend two special presentations (from AT&T and Verizon) and got a one-on-one meeting with Steve Mannel (GTM Industry Lead) Even though all US mobile operators use Salesforce, I wanted to know why T-Mobile has been successful? • T-Mobile implement more modules than other operators such as residential “appointment scheduling” function and goes deeper into it operations. • T-Mobile considers Salesforce to be a program (that runs continuously vs a project) using agile method and supported with cultural changes around Salesforce. Technology is not the main problem. Both PwC and Deloitte are helping Salesforce to implement Salesforce Salesforce Garden internally as an additional resource. Lesson learnt: Deep implementation with cultural change. 6 Huawei Purposefulness “We must have done something right …” Rotating CEO, Guo Ping. This is the third time I've attended MWC. In previous visits, the event was very much focused on technologies and solutions. This year all operators (SingTel, , Orange, KT etc.) considered social responsibilities (CO2 emission, environment etc. ) as one of their major goals.

Lesson learnt: Purpose is no longer a buzzword; it ties With all the pressures from US and Europe regarding closely to the success of a company. security, Huawei operated one of the biggest exhibition areas in MWC19. On top of the solutions No Poverty Zero Hunger Health Education Gender Equality Clean water Clean Energy Decent work Innovation exhibition area, Huawei operated a Cafe and a Food Court within its own space. Huawei’s exhibition area was definitely the marquee that attracted a lot more visitors than its competitors. Even on the last day of the event, I could still see long queues of people waiting to visit their booth. Reduced Sustainable Responsible Climate Life Below Life on Land Peace Partnerships Inequalities water

Lesson learnt : The best way to counteract pressure is not to retreat BUT to resolve by facts.

7 Undoubtedly, 5G was the main theme of this event. All operators announced their 5G roadmap and most handset vendors presented their 5G handsets: , LG V50, Galaxy Fold, Samsung S10, Xiaomi Mi Mix 3 and ZTE Axon 10 Pro. Both Huawei and Samsung showed their foldable phones too. More AR/VR/MR (Artificial/Virtual/Mixed Reality) products are coming; and plenty of choices on 5G- enabled cars. As I could see, 5G products will be generally available by late 2019 and early 2020. My view: The true value of 5G has yet to be understood by consumers. Investment cycle would be long (2-3 years) before the real 5G value becomes appreciated by the public.

8 Mobile Security My focus was to identify the latest trend in mobile security. HKBN currently has over 1,100 users using mobile email access (either thru handsets or laptops). Phishing emails comprise the majority of our security breaches. To raise our security level to world class, I made visits to many of the security companies that are not available in Hong Kong. In summary, there are three major trends in combating mobile security : • Artificial Intelligent (AI) - using AI to identify abnormal use of remote access and alert the operator immediately. The solution will learn the normal behaviour and identify abnormality by itself. “Inpedio” from Israel is one such company. • Pattern recognition - some vendors maintain a vast storage of phishing email patterns all over the world in different languages that keep updating numerous times daily. The system will automatically censor out phishing emails. “Cyan” from Austria is one of the solution providers supporting many operators in Europe including T-Mobile. • “Passwordless” – using mobile devices and biometric login to replace standard password logins. In this case, users are not required to remember any passwords. As a result, he/she will not be prone to password disclosures via phishing. Two startups called “Strongkey” and “Avira” are providing solutions on this.

All of them are interested to resell their solutions to the Hong Kong market thru HKBN. I’ll pass these contacts to our security team for follow-up.

My views: If we want to stay at the forefront, we need to extend our vision and learn from new solutions continuously. IoT security will be another major concern. “Firedome” is a company focused on home IOT security.

9 Ben Yeung’s Pre-Trip reflection

• Why? MWC Barcelona is the crystal ball of the mobile industry in the coming 10 years (but not likely in the next 2 years). The exhibition is filled with diversified sets of innovative dreams and development plans from R&D and marketing of different vendors – network, devices, solutions, applications…etc. By witnessing the future developments, we'll be clued in on where our direction should steer toward.

• What to find out? 1. e-Sim – who are providing e-sim service globally? iPhone has launched e-sim capability, but the take-up rate is very slow, many MNOs are reluctant to provide e-service or only provide fake e-sim service. I have tried to contact various potential service providers, but the response is very weak. European MVNOs have been providing such services for a while, so we should be able to meet some providers there. 2. 5G – many discussions say that the high speed and capacity of 5G mobile can replace the last mile of fixed broadband. Is it true? What’s the cost involved? 3. Mobile fixed convergence – what are the latent opportunities and how should we prepare in the coming two years? 4. Mobile trend – are there any new mobile services that can be deployed by MVNO?

• How to move forward? Establish people network there and harness them later.

10 Post Trip reflections – Ben Yeung

This was my first time at MWC Barcelona - the biggest Congress in the Mobile World, the Holy Land that all mobile players must visit yearly. To me, it's a great learning despite the exhaustion:

• Its huge – the total exhibition turnover is equivalent to 10-15% GDP of the whole Barcelona. Eight Exhibition Halls with thousands of exhibitors. A Topic Tour - Internet of Thing (IoT) took me three hours to visit over 60 IoT related booths, all of them have actual products to demonstrate. • Its eye-opening - a beauty contest for the vendors of mobile equipment and solutions. (Focus of the year – 5G ecosystem, Huawei foldable Mate X handset and Samsung Galaxy Fold with 6 camera lens). 5G is ahead of schedule and a clear 5G roll-out roadmap was found. • It was thought provoking - many interesting new applications, ranging from daily lifestyle products to industrial machines and enterprise solutions. • Great for people networking – met many senior management executives from the mobile industry and had chats with them over the course of the event (several days).

Overall, the mobile industry will earn the fastest growth rate through the development of 5G, IoT, AI/VR & Big Data.

11 The big picture of mobile market development

• The focus of mobile market is Intelligent Connectivity, highlighted thru - 5G, AI, IoT and Big Data • The size of worldwide mobile market is 5.1 Billion mobile subs: 8.8 Billion mobile connections; 3.3 billion mobile Internet users contributing 4.5% to Global GDP Some facts - Mobile market potential

• By 2025, the market will have 400% data growth, but the revenue growth will be less than 1% • IoT will have fastest growth. The share of Global IoT revenue will be 95% on Apps, Platforms & service, but only 5% on connectivity

=> operators will suffer if they provide connectivity only, they must tap into apps, platforms & vertical services. eSIM – an opportunity?

Source : GSMA Intelligence

At the early stage, not popular until 2020/21 • Assume that all smartphone vendors decide to adopt eSIM, it will still take 2-4 years replacement time for a full range of devices to have eSIM. Wider eSIM ecosystem, boosting volumes and driving down eSIM cost will be the key factors to succeed. The momentum is accelerating • Devices with eSIM – Apple iPhone XR , Googles Pixel 3 and 3XL, smart watches from Garmin, Apple, Huawei, Mobvoi and Samsung … • Nearly 50 operators across 20 countries already support the feature

eSIM is a great potential for MVNO, but we need to be patient. A good learning from Japanese MVNO - Rakuten

• Rakuten has successfully transformed from a MVNO to MNO in Japan

• Rakuten has built the first end-to-end cloud-native mobile network https://apac01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Frakuten.today%2Fblog%2Frakutens-upcoming-end-to-end-cloud-native- mobile- network.html&data=01%7C01%7Cben.yeung%40hkbn.com.hk%7C0a001e9fbab4472e118708d6a11c1a4e%7Cb098cc1aaaa5436a8fc133a51c ef2d55%7C0&sdata=FcHweJL2QVg47RbNYW060ocNT9%2FHtmll83mQb%2BKtzpI%3D&reserved=0 • To disrupt the traditional mobile market, Rakuten has outlined the importance to enable consumers to access connectivity, commerce, communications, and content in an easy and convenient manner. • Some interesting topics: payment going cashless, fintech, blockchain, big data applications... etc. William Kwan’s Pre-trip reflection

• I have attended other events in the US and Asia, but this was my first time at MWC (Europe), the biggest Telecom event in the industry. This is also the one with different business scopes, we aimed to take away modern trends and any potential opportunities. • 5G and IoT is a hot topic in the world nowadays (of course other big topics include Big Data and Digitalization etc). It will be vital to see how the technology is evolving, what is the status of new 5G concepts such as the virtual mobile operator, how operators can run the backhaul more efficiently, and whether there are any new complete service solution for IoT service providers and is if there are any new ways to enable operators to run FTTH more efficiently? Hopefully we also gain some experience sharing from different operators as well. • Area of interests: • 5G trends • IoT trends • Fibre technology

16 Post Trip reflections – William Kwan

MWC Barcelona, the event began with the message “This is what we’re waiting for”…Yes, this is what we’ve come for…The Oscars of the telecom industry. More than 109,000 visitors from over 198 countries attended MWC19 Barcelona, more than 2,400 companies showcased the latest in technology, products and services.

This year the GSMA introduced its facial recognition service BREEZ (Biometric Recognition Easy Entry Zone). Participation in BREEZ allowed contactless entry for attendees, meaning that we did not need to show our ID or have our badge scanned in order to enter the event at venue entry points and restricted areas, the face scanning reduced wait times and increased security.

Simon Segars, CEO of Arm, said “We’re building for our children”. Many attendees were in Barcelona focused on pushing technology forward because we expected much benefit it can deliver. Beyond this though, we also think about the generations following and building the technology to serve. The message on the stage deeply touched me as it was the whole purpose of this trip.

17 Huawei 5G

The US and its allies have strongly blocked the survival of • The biggest challenges the Huawei’s 5G equipment in the international arena on the industry will face are the capital grounds of national security. However, Huawei is fully outlay necessary to build 5G committed to 5G related equipment and patent projects, networks and spectrum costs. In making many US allies dare to take risk and turned their Europe, heavy regulation and backs. licence durations are also damaging the economic case for Currently Huawei’s 5G patents has reached 1,529 items, new technology. the most in the industry. China’s technology giants including Huawei and ZTE etc have 36% of 5G patents and • believes in new antenna more than 2 times of 4G patents, while US companies technology that would have only 14% of key 5G patents. Huawei has already revolutionise the antenna taken a big lead in this area with double the amount held industry. They aim to distribute by Qualcomm. In the past 4G era, Chinese enterprises had antennas everywhere by pushing to pay the patent license fee to obtain the right to use. antenna development into the Now the situation may be reversed. size of a matchbox or adhesive tape. • Also, it was interesting to hear the story about Rakuten, who is building their cloud-native mobile network in a short period of time without significant capex investment. IoT 5G Microwave

• In some of our customer cases, IoT devices Solution for providing high speed (ie. 10 Gbps+) radio are often put in places such as stairwells or connectivity for mobile operator to use as a radio basements in large concrete buildings backhaul. Despite this, fibre will remain the prime where wireless coverage extension is choice considering its performance and reliability. required. Interestingly, we found one IoT Mesh system. which solves the last-mile connectivity problem by allowing the sensor devices to act as transceivers and provide connectivity extension to far-off sensor devices. • Vodafone – Moving just connectivity to intelligent connectivity