MWC: Twitter's Costolo disappoints delegates

But HTC causes a buzz with a raft of announcements

Twitter CEO Dick Costolo has been slammed by business analysts following his speech at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona today.

Delivering the keynote speech on the second day of the conference, Costolo admitted that Twitter is not well integrated into most smartphones and that actually only 40 per cent of people using Twitter do so from a mobile device.

Eden Zoller, Ovum principal analyst, said Costolo didn't offer enough insight or guidance into how businesses can leverage Twitter to increase profitability.

"Twitter quoted figures on healthy growth and use, which is good but not surprising. What it didn't provide was concrete detail on how effective its nascent businesses are in driving revenue," she said.

"We also expected more on what Twitter is doing to build its application ecosystem given the importance of apps in adding value to the service and the fact that a growing number of Twitter users interact with the service via apps. We also hoped Twitter would show its intentions for mobile location and search."

The show also saw the release of research into mobile healthcare, with a report from The United Nations Foundations and Vodafone Foundation Technology Partnership.

This looked at disease surveillance, supply chains and human resources – and identifies issues around data collection and transfer.

The partnership also announced a new research project in coordination with the Pan-America Health Organisation (PAHO) and the Brazilian Ministry of Health to improve health in these regions.

There were also more product launches on day two – most notably from HTC. The device manufacturer has unveiled its first tablet PC, the Android-powered HTC Flyer. The company will also refresh its Desire and Wildfire smartphone ranges and bring its Incredible series to the UK.

This is all in addition to two, already well hyped, Facebook phones, dubbed the ChaCha and the Salsa.

Tony Cripps, Ovum principal analyst, described HTC's tablet effort as a cautious first move into the space and not one that it expects to compete on a volume basis with its smartphones.

"On the innovation side, the Flyer features HTC Watch, a video download and instant playback service that will live or die depending on the size and breadth of the content catalog HTC is able to build for it. It may also benefit from the partnership HTC announced last week with OnLive for online gaming," he said.

"Either way, HTC deserves credit for pushing its own boundaries and acting on the need to bring more than just hardware to market if it is to remain competitive."

And delegates were also treated to a glimpse of the future of motoring when NXP Semiconductors and automotive supplier Continental demonstrated a concept car equipped with near field communication (NFC) technology.

After using their NFC-enabled smartphone to unlock the car, the driver received a personal welcome message, set their comfort preferences and then, as soon as the phone was placed in a dock on the dashboard, had an on-board entertainment and communication system.