MWC has been a harbinger of things to come, if not for the devices and handsets at least for the mobile infrastructure and network applications space with particular focus on the operators. [Much of the device magic it is believed is lost to CES] – that being the case, it was no surprise that this year’s Barcelona Mecca was resplendent with global bigwigs from the infrastructure space painting the town red with their coolest goodies to woo the big celcos.

It was clearly a reverberating event with so much more energy than last year’s recession soaked mobile February in Spain (despite that day 3 of the 2011 event was actually a rain-washed day] with temperatures falling and the Fera de Barcelona dripping wet.

None of that threw water over the enthusiastic crowds as the top themes of this year’s mobile bash of the planet unfolded. We were fortunate to be there to catch up on the action and here is what we saw.

WAC – Wholesale Apps Community, is an initiative that is working with key organizations to lead a transformation in mobile application development. Launched at MWC 2010, WAC is uniting a fragmented apps marketplace creating an open industry platform benefiting apps developers, handsets firms, OS owners, network operators and end users. WAC had its first commercial launch this year and launched WAC-powered operator store-fronts and WAC powered handsets. This is one step ahead of the original GSMA OneAPI initiative and GSMA which is the driving force behind this targets to build a global developer community using a single SDK to access billions of devices.

China Mobile, MTS, Orange, Smart, Telefonica, Verizon, Telenor, Verizon and Vodafone are signed up and launching WAC 1.0 apps.

Global TD-LTE Initiative – GTI the global TD-LTE Initiative, was launched by the ceo group of leading global cellular operators including Bharti Airtel, China Mobile and Softbank with a clear objective: support and promote the convergence of te two LTE standards: TD-LTE and FDD LTE. China Mobile which seems to be in the driver’s seat in the TD-LTE stream clearly pushed for the creation of a global open eco-system that would allow formation of the new supply chain that will provide higher speed, better experience and lower cost and improved frequency efficiency. This will also be the final nail in WiMax’s coffin – said ceo of Bharti Airtel.

HTML5 - HTML 5 is a language for structuring and presenting content for the World Wide Web, a core technology of the Internet. Its core aims have been to improve the language with support for the latest multimedia while keeping it easily readable by humans and consistently understood by computers and devices and with the emerging hi-speed LTE networks becoming a reality, this new standard is expected to be supported on devices / to ensure better quality experience as well as proper delivery of services across the billions of devices out there.

Overwhelming China angle – Interesting departure from its heavy infrastructure play, Huawei decided to show its focus on its device segment by launching Smart Device – a return to the Simple life. The Ideos X3, Mobile WiFi SmartPro, Ideos S7 slim as well as other home devices were on launch. The Huawei, ChinaMobile, ZTE display and coverage areas indicated quietly the unassailable strength of the China force that seems to be blowing over the Spanish horizon at the MWC.

Mhealth, MConnected apps in the App Planet were innumerable and there were enough goodies to go around for a full week for the techno-geek. All in all, it was a much stronger, vibrant MWC than the 2010 piece.

While crowds faded away slowly by Saturday, Barcelona was settling down for a well-deserved break, after putting in long weeks of preparing for a snag-free event.  So long until next February..