With AI undoubtedly revolutionizing the way many office jobs get done, the effects new technology is having on blue-collar jobs often flies under the radar.
But it is in these hands-on industries where AI can really make a difference, boosting not only productivity and efficiency, but also improving safety and worker welfare.
At its recent Samsara Beyond 2026 conference, I saw first-hand some of the new AI-powered tools and services which could revolutionize the operations industry in years to come - but also heard why the human connection will always remain vital.
AI improvement
"Humans are extremely capable - and I don't see the machines or AI replacing that anytime soon - I see it augmenting us, and helping us," Johan Land, CPO at Samsara tells me at the event.
We're speaking after a jam-packed keynote which saw the company reveal a host of new AI-empowered tools and services, from a smart shipping label sticker, to a 360-degree camera which can help truck drivers navigate cramped delivery yards.
But it was the new AI tools which drew a lot of attention, including the ability for drivers to talk directly to their manager or an AI agent remotely, as well as a new AI Studio which lets customers create bespoke offerings for specific use cases - so why such a big focus on AI right now, I ask Land.
"First of all, the AI has got so much better over time - but then in addition to that, our customers want it," he notes, highlighting how Samsara can help customers on how to best plug AI into their systems.
"Physical operations is tough! It's very labor-intensive, there are many tasks that are very repetitive and it's hard to hire people - so this solves a really acute problem in that sense."
Ryan Yu, VP of Product at Samsara, agrees with Land, telling me Samsara's goal, "is to be the operating system for physical operations."
When it comes to improving the efficiency of customer's workflows, "there's so much low-hanging fruit", he notes, highlighting the importance automating the big things, in a way that makes sense.
Samsara's customer base is everyone from mining operations to building firms, from school districts to logistics firms, so I ask Land how important AI will be as a selling point over its competition - and how eager these more "traditional" industries are to get working with AI.
"The hardest thing with AI is probably making it work for people in their real life and to create true value," he says, "it can easily become vaporware, it looks good on the surface"
"Sometimes they get it (AI), and sometimes they don't," he adds, "but it doesn't matter - and it might be even better if you don't understand it, because their expectations are super high...that's the empowerment, they expect it to just work."
"We need to provide the rails," Yu adds, "and we also need to provide guidance to what types of use cases are best served...because the underlying technology is still evolving."
AI augmenting humans
So how long will it be before even the most hands-on industries are fully embracing AI to get their work done? Land notes that the work is already well underway.
"Overall, we see the AI augmenting humans, taking care of some tasks," he says, "but overall it's making humans more empowered, stronger and capable."
Yu notes the immediate future will be dominated by the themes of "discovery, education and adoption" by customers, and the role Samsara can play in this.
"We want to make sure we meet them where they are, and provide the right templates," he notes, "and the good thing is we know what their most important use cases are, and what they struggle with...when we talk about reducing manual drudgery, we understand deeply how customers engage with their products."
"This is a time of distractions," Land laughs, "but for us it's very simple, we follow our customers, we just talk to them, understand what their problems are, what they need from us, and then that's how we prioritize literally everything we do."
"The direction this is going is that a job site or workplace of the future will have all kinds of things inside of it...the way we see ourselves to be is as the connecting tissue - the agentic platform that ties all of this together."
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