The "Pokemon GO" Gen 3 update may be released this year. Niantic CEO John Hanke shared some interesting information about their hit AR mobile game during the 2017 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Hanke also discussed the company's other AR game, Ingress, during his speech.

According to Niantic CEO John Hanke, the company has scheduled three major "Pokemon GO" updates for 2017. He even mentioned that the Gen 2 update is just the first of the three planned updates.

"With Pokemon Go, we're only getting started with the game," said the Niantic Boss. "We have three major new releases mapped out for this year."

The Gen 2 update added 80 new Pokemon to the game. Since this update only counts as the first major update, it is safe to say that the other earlier updates are of the minor kind and fans can expect two more updates that are as big as the introduction of the Gen 2s to the Augmented Reality game.

After Hanke's speech, a number of speculations have surfaced as to what the two major updates will be. An intriguing theory is that one of the three major updates is the "Pokemon GO" Gen 3 update.

The Gen 3 update is highly possible. Since Hanke revealed that the Gen 2 update is the first of three, fans can expect that the two upcoming updates will be as content heavy as the Gen 2 update.

It is also noteworthy that it took seven months for Niantic to introduce the Gen 2 update, which added the 80 Gen 2 Pokemon. If the company will follow the same timeline, it is highly likely that the months of September of October will be when the "Pokemon GO" Gen 3 update will be introduced.

Other updates to be expected are the addition of the PvP battle and the upgrade to the AR game's trading system. The "Pokemon GO" Gen 3 update will still be the next major update that fans will be looking forward to.