Energy! The one word used over and over again to describe CTIA’s Wireless show last week in Atlanta was energy, as in “There’s a lot of energy this year.” People were downright giddy about the long lines for onsite registration at the show and the amount of traffic on the show floor. It’s probably a bit too early to pop the collective cork on the champagne, but the people in the wireless industry are truly optimistic about the industry-and not that nice “I believe in my company and my industry” optimism, but a deeper “Woo-hoo we made it through and let’s move forward” kind of optimism.
This year’s show didn’t seem to have an over-arching theme or produce earth-shattering news from any one vendor or wireless carrier. Instead it was punctuated by a calmer observation that carriers sent more employees to the show than they had in years past. (Companies focused on cost-cutting in the last two years couldn’t justify sending a lot of employees out to meet with vendors when they had no intention of buying anything.) This year it seemed more people were wearing carrier badges-and not wearing them backwards because they were trying to avoid sellers.
Likewise, vendors seemed to send more people to the show, whether to handle booth traffic or to meet with potential suppliers and partners. On a lighter note, booth babes were out in force (yuck!) trying to lure executives into their booth space. (Of course, few of them could actually answer any questions about the products and services they touted.) And vendors put on bigger fare during their after-hours parties. Joe Walsh and Glenn Frey, Alanis Morissette and Train performed for select audiences.
All of CTIA’s keynote sessions were well attended, but that’s nothing new. Of note this year was that the six carrier CEOs on stage on Day 3 of the keynote formed their own little comedy club. As these “It” men of the industry yukked it up, the audience (at least around me) was enamoured. No biting comments from the gallery. (On a side note, AT&T Wireless did not have its CEO on stage; AWS employees obviously are nervous about their impending sale to Cingular Wireless and a little miffed CEO John Zeglis and some other upper-echelon managers are making out like bandits from the sale.)
A final observation: CTIA President Steve Largent will do fine corralling this herd of cats that is wireless. Largent is a charismatic guy who has combined the ease of a politician who can adapt to the unexpected with the self-assuredness that comes from his athletic successes. He’ll need both.
