Samsung’s Gear S3 smartwatch now seeing service by SATS ground crew on Changi airport tarmac

While detractors have said that smartwatches aren’t yet innovative enough or sufficiently robust to stand up to actual field use and are little more than fancied up watches that tell the time while needing constant recharging, Samsung’s recently launched Gear S3 smartwatches seems to have bucked the trend as they’re now being put to use on the airport tarmac at Changi Airport in Singapore by SATS Ltd ground crew.

For the uninitiated, SATS Ltd is the ground handling and in-flight catering service provider for Changi airport and handles almost 80% of onsite ground handling and catering for planes parked or transiting at Changi. Basically, they haul your luggage up to and down from the plane and make sure you get an inflight meal that doesn’t consist of just a bag of peanuts. The work environment is noisy as all heck: a jet engine kicks out enough sound that everyone has to wear earmuffs or go deaf and working on what is essentially a blazing hot swath of concrete in the middle of the blazing sun all day with equipment being tossed around willy nilly means it isn’t easy on personnel or equipment.The fact that thousands of planes transit to and fro Changi every year means that they’re on a tight schedule to turn around a plane, dismount or load luggage and food and then get ready for the next one. In this kind of environment,  any gear used by SATs ground crew will have to be as reliable as it gets.

To that end, SATS acquired 130 Gear S3 smartwatches for their technical ramp-handling staff to enhance communication and efficiency. The SATs team clock in at the beginning of their shifts and get their work duty schedules and instructions in real-time via their Gear S3s and pair up the device with their bone-conductor headsets via Bluetooth so they communicate even in the middle of the noisy work environment. This saves on paper and staff are more productive too. Every second saved means more time and less flight delays, which is a good thing if you’re staring at a red eye express flight to Seattle at midnight.

The Gear S3 comes in two different designs, is rated IP68 for water and dust resistance, runs on Samsung’s Tizen OS and offers four days of battery life on a single charge with hands-free calling and connectivity with both Android and iOS phones. It has recently been launched in Malaysia for RM1,399 with a limited edition watch case and two complimentary straps in two different designs – the slim Gear S3 Classic and the chunkier Gear S3 Frontier. For more on the Gear S3 swing by Samsung’s official site here www.samsung.com/my.

Image: Samsung A A Gear S3 Frontier smartwatch is IP68 rated water and dust resistant and has 4 days of rated battery life