Samsara Inc. has introduced a 360-degree AI camera built for the equipment used in construction, warehousing, mining and airport operations, together with a companion equipment-monitoring offering. The Samsara 360 Camera uses a dual-fisheye lens to capture a full view around a machine from a single mounting point, extending the safety and visibility tools the company already sells for road fleets to machines working in harsher environments.
The company frames the product around a gap it says exists for open-cab equipment. Excavators, forklifts and pushback tractors on job sites, warehouse floors, mines and airport aprons are often operated within feet of coworkers and other machines, and Samsara says none of that equipment had a camera system designed for the job. Without footage captured at ground level, it argues, incident investigations stall, liability becomes disputed and the same unsafe behaviors can be repeated.
One mount instead of four cameras
Conventional 360-degree setups for equipment typically require four cameras, four mounts and a separate recorder, according to Samsara. The 360 Camera is designed to capture the full surround view from a single mount point, with managers able to pan and zoom through any recorded event to review it from different angles. It installs in the same way as a Samsara dash cam and is built to withstand harsh weather and rough operating conditions, the company says.
David Gal, vice president of product and engineering at Samsara, said frontline operators of forklifts, excavators and ground equipment do some of the riskiest work in physical operations, on machines with open cabs, no windshield and no roof, with hazards on every side. He said the camera was built to survive those conditions and to see all the way around the operator, so customers can protect workers on the warehouse floor, the job site and the airport ramp in the same way they do on the road.
Detections and the Safety Inbox
Samsara AI, which the company says draws on nearly a decade of its AI Dash Cam work, turns that footage into a safety program. According to Samsara, teams can:
- Review every angle of risk, with AI detections flagging mobile phone use, camera obstruction, seat and lap belt use, and harsh impacts, trained on how equipment is actually operated.
- Identify where risks concentrate, seeing which operators, sites and equipment types show repeat risky behavior; each impact automatically pulls video into the Samsara Safety Inbox, so investigations can be closed on evidence rather than competing accounts.
- Act before a repeat incident, coaching operators on their own footage, enforcing zero-tolerance mobile phone policies and speeding up OSHA investigations without adding headcount. Timestamped footage can support insurance claims and help establish or clear liability quickly.
Combined with equipment monitoring
Samsara for Equipment places monitoring and agents on the same platform customers use for their road fleets. Teams can see how long each forklift or excavator sits idling, schedule preventive maintenance on actual engine hours rather than the calendar, and check how many forklifts actually run at peak before buying more. Samsara agents work with the equipment out of the box, so a fault code can open a work order automatically. The company also says every vehicle, piece of equipment and operator can live on one platform instead of a separate OEM portal for each equipment brand.