IBM has announced “major collaborations” with SmartCone, Guardhat, Garmin Health and Mitsufuji that will help to monitor the safety of workers in hazardous environments.

The collaborations will use internet of things (IOT) technologies that have been integrated into wearables, the tech giant said in an announcement Wednesday. Workers in sectors including factories, construction and mining will use the technology, IBM added.

The company’s technology will be used to assess environmental and biometric data to help determine if workers are exposed to danger or risk. Smart devices, wearables and environmental sensors will be used to collect the data in near real-time.  

“Worker safety is a critical priority for all enterprises and this collaboration is a major milestone in dramatically improving the way enterprises identify and eliminate hazards in the workplace,” Kareem Yusuf, general manager at IBM Watson IoT, said in a statement.

As technology develops, a number of industries and businesses are using it to try and boost the safety of employees in the workplace.

Mining giant BHP, for instance, is using everything from autonomous drills at iron ore mines to trialing “smart caps” that analyze brain waves and monitor worker fatigue.

Of the new collaboration with IBM, Garmin Health’s Global Product Lead, Travis Johnson, said that the combination of “the powerful analytic capabilities of the IBM Watson IoT solution with the high-quality sensor data and long battery life of Garmin devices creates a great solution for remotely monitoring workers with minimal user burden.”

Source: cnbc.com