Personal Protective Equipment trend report: Getting protected and connected

These vendors are said to be focussing aggressively on innovation, as well as on including advanced technologies in their existing products. 

According to the study over the coming years, key PPE vendors are also expected to take up partnerships and mergers and acquisitions as their key strategy for business development.

Increasing global awareness of the importance of worker protection is partly responsible for the growth but advances in technology are also having an important impact. With the increasing digitalisation of the workplace and rise of Industry 4.0, smart PPE and wearable technology has arrived and its potential to improve worker protection, enhance employee wellbeing and improve efficiency is enormous. Today’s worker needs to be connected as well as protected.

Smart PPE to become commonplace
Simon Field, a technical specialist at science-based technology company 3M, sees smart PPE becoming the norm in many workplaces: “Going forward, I think smart and connected personal protective equipment (PPE) will become much more commonplace across a wide range of industries. Technology is permeating our personal and work lives like never before, and the potential benefits for workplace safety are significant. Innovations in above-the-neck PPE have the potential to revolutionise the field of workplace safety, helping workers to avoid hazards more effectively and simply than ever before.”

Field gives the example of 3M’s Organic Gas and Vapour End of Service Life Indicator Filters as a case where smart technology is improving worker safety. The filters use End of Service Life Indicator (ESLI) technology to give users a clear visual warning when they need to change their filters. This technology, which is said to be the first of its kind, can help to combat the problem of some respiratory protective equipment (RPE) users only changing their filters once they detect contaminant odour, taste or contamination inside the respirator, meaning the substance has already broken through.

New product concepts
According to PPE manufacturer uvex, the mega trend of digital transformation now offers completely new product concepts in the field of personal protective equipment which can be used to successfully face the extensive level of change in the industrial sector. "New digital technologies enable existing safety functions to be enhanced in ways not possible until now as well as unique approaches to ensuring people's protection and physical comfort", explains Stefan Brück, CEO of the uvex safety group.” The uvex safety group has established a dedicated "Digital Business Innovation" division for the development of its digital product system uvex techware.

Equipped with sensors and actuators that can interconnect PPE, uvex’s new wearable digital technologies can react, interact and communicate with the wearer, according to the situation. This imparts increased safety, protection and comfort to the wearer on the most vulnerable parts of their body during their working day.

Innovations include the lightweight uvex i-works techware, a smart safety spectacle that allows information to be visualised on the inner surface of the lens while being worn, so giving users access to sensor data at any time. The concept optimises low energy consumption. On the workwear front the new uvex suXXeed workwear collection incorporates smart gesture control at different points on PPE, allowing the control of devices without touching them, using 3D gesture detection technology. This prevents potential contamination and the need to remove safety products such as gloves in order to control functions on smartphones, smart glasses or machines.

In safety footwear the uvex techware safety shoes use smart insoles that can detect and evaluate hazardous situations, such as the risk of slipping, alerting the wearer and enabling stress-free avoidance. Meta sensors enable the safety-related properties of shoes to be determined, in addition to movement information, in order to actively identify potential damage and the loss of safety features.

The uvex techware range also includes smart helmets; safety gloves and active safety vests.

Other innovation in intelligent safety footwear comes from Intellinium whose smart shoes allow workers to send and receive messages handsfree, without the need for a separate smartphone. Alerts can be sent using Intellinium’s patented force sensor membrane built into the toe of the boot and connected to Sierra Wireless’ AirPrime HL series cellular module. During an emergency, a worker can acknowledge receiving a message to evacuate by touching a toe to the sensor. Or he can quickly send a “mayday” alert if he’s injured. Built-in sensors detect falls or shocks, immediately notifying the employer or a colleague of the worker’s location to enable faster, more accurate response.

Monitor multiple parameters
Cleo Cabuz, vice president of engineering and chief technology officer for Honeywell Industrial Safety, believes that above-the-neck PPE is one of the areas where some of the most exciting technology developments are taking place: “In the era of Industry 4.0, RFID and Bluetooth-enabled PPE can already connect to smartphones to become edge devices able to collect and transmit data.In future, by using retrofitted wireless data transfer technology, like Near Field Communication (NFC), everything from eyewear to hardhats could become connected, while further innovations in wearable sensors could make it possible to monitor any parameter that affects a worker’s health."

In hearing protection, for example, one of the key trends is enhancing communication while preserving hearing in the long term, explains Cabuz: “Increasingly, devices such as earmuffs are becoming communication hubs that connect to smartphones via Bluetooth, enabling workers to answer phone calls, hear alarms or receive vital instructions without putting their hearing at risk. Additionally, the integration of miniaturised microphones to register residual noise, combined with software and cloud technology, is enabling a new, app-based approach to hearing conservation, with the ability to monitor sound exposure in real time and fight noise induced hearing loss (NIHL).”

According to Cabuz, hardhats also have great potential to be transformed into smart devices which could help the safety industry move towards an information-driven approach to workplace risk reduction: “Hardhats embedded with miniaturised biometric sensors could gauge and monitor in real time, through sweat and pulse, vital parameters such as heart rate, body temperature, and stress, which can be early signs of an imminent threat.”

Honeywell’s Cabuz thinks the rise of smart PPE is good news for a workforce with a changing demographic: “This connected approach could encourage the uptake and correct use of PPE among millennials, who are expected to make up to  50 per cent of the global working population by 2020. By equipping itself with the kind of technology that meets the expectations of this generation of digital-natives, the safety industry will put itself in the best position to protect their health in the long term.

“At the other end of the spectrum, smart PPE that can address the needs of the ageing workforce will be of increasing importance. Statistics show that occupational fatalities are more likely to occur among older workers with many of these fatalities due to lack of appropriate preventative measures and effective rescue procedures,” adds Cabuz.

Rethinking physical limitations
With this in mind the announcement from Ford in August 2018 that it has ordered 75 robotic suits from Ekso Bionics which is the biggest order to date brings to the fore a technology which shows a lot of promise to overcome the limitations of an ageing workforce.

Ford employees in 15 plants and seven countries around the world will now be able to use an EksoVest to help lessen the physical toll that their job takes on their body; some Ford employees lift the equivalent of a bag of flour or a watermelon over their head up to 4,600 times a day during the car building process. Ford partnered with Ekso Bionics to enhance this wearable technology that elevates and supports a worker’s arms while performing overhead tasks such as reaching up with a power tool to screw bolts to secure the car’s brace – all while standing underneath the vehicle.

The EksoVest fits workers ranging from 5 feet 2 inches tall to 6 feet 4 inches tall and provides lift assistance from five pounds to 15 pounds per arm. Ford workers say it’s comfortable because it’s lightweight and not bulky, allowing them to move their arms easily.

“At Ekso, our mission is to augment human capability with wearable technology and robotics that help people rethink current physical limitations and achieve the remarkable,” explains Jack Peurach, president and chief executive officer of Ekso Bionics.

What's next - the Carbon Age?
If the EksoVest isn’t enough to make your mind boggle the first graphene jacket has just been launched by consumer brand Vollebak. Graphene is the lightest, strongest, most conductive material ever discovered, and according to Vollebak has the same potential to change life on Earth as stone, bronze and iron once did. But it remains difficult to work with. Described as Part jacket. Part science experiment the company has been selling the first graphene-coated jacket as a prototype and inviting user feedback. Vollebak’s view is that the next 1,000 years might be the Carbon Age with wearable technology becoming increasingly invisible over the next 10 to 20 years. Instead of wearing it over your eyes or on your wrist, it will be embedded as clothing and tech simply merge. Says Vollebak: “Graphene’s ability to conduct heat and power and withstand insane forces, while adding zero mass, should make it central to the story. It’s a supermaterial with the same potential to change life on Earth as stone, bronze and iron once did. The earlier we start the journey, the faster we get to the future.”

1. https://www.zionmarketresearch.com/news/personal-protective-equipment-market

2.https://trademarketresearch.com/51223/smart-personal-protective-equipment-ppe-market-report-presents-an-overall-analysis-development-trends-driving-forces-opportunities-and-future-potential-2023/