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For the 87% of buildings that can't afford a real BMS retrofit, Tekifi shows a non-intrusive step forward: wireless sensors and a private cellular network as a deliberate stop gap
At one 800-bed hospital, the surgeons were threatening to strike. The operating theaters were too hot, then too cold, and the archaic BMS that was supposed to keep them comfortable was no longer supported by anyone.
Maintenance was paying contractors to come in daily to adjust the controls by hand. AHUs were running 24/7 in hand mode. There was no budget for a BMS replacement.
That was the brief Conor Cleary, Technical Director at Tekifi, walked into. The Dublin-based consulting engineering firm had a choice: pitch the right answer (a full BMS retrofit) the hospital couldn't afford, or do something non-intrusive that might actually get bought.
They picked non-intrusive. Tekifi started with an audit, talking to surgeons, nurses, and maintenance staff before specifying any kit. The audit revealed the existing BMS sensors weren't physically in the right locations. The BMS lacked accurate sensor feedback to ever have a chance of controlling the spaces correctly.
Tekifi's solution covered just four AHUs serving eight operating theaters. Wireless room and duct temperature sensors communicated with a LoRaWAN gateway to a cloud dashboard. It's the kind of bolt-on stack that often wouldn't pass as a scalable smart building solution. The system didn't replace the old sensors and couldn't control the BMS. But it could be installed without scheduling downtime, and it didn't need integration approval from IT since it sat on its own wireless network.
The maintenance team made manual BMS tweaks based on overlay alerts when conditions drifted out of range. Surgeon complaints dropped overnight. Daily contractor visits stopped. Cleary cited sub-12-month ROI and an estimated 10–15% HVAC savings, caveated as "not fully validated" since the project is recent.
Cleary was candid about meeting the building owner where they were at. "It's not an ideal solution by any means. It's not long term. There is plans to do a wider BMS upgrade within the hospital, but the funds aren't there. So it's a stop-gap really."
For the 87% of buildings that don't have the budget or attention for a proper technology upgrade, something is better than nothing.
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At one 800-bed hospital, the surgeons were threatening to strike. The operating theaters were too hot, then too cold, and the archaic BMS that was supposed to keep them comfortable was no longer supported by anyone.
Maintenance was paying contractors to come in daily to adjust the controls by hand. AHUs were running 24/7 in hand mode. There was no budget for a BMS replacement.
That was the brief Conor Cleary, Technical Director at Tekifi, walked into. The Dublin-based consulting engineering firm had a choice: pitch the right answer (a full BMS retrofit) the hospital couldn't afford, or do something non-intrusive that might actually get bought.
They picked non-intrusive. Tekifi started with an audit, talking to surgeons, nurses, and maintenance staff before specifying any kit. The audit revealed the existing BMS sensors weren't physically in the right locations. The BMS lacked accurate sensor feedback to ever have a chance of controlling the spaces correctly.
Tekifi's solution covered just four AHUs serving eight operating theaters. Wireless room and duct temperature sensors communicated with a LoRaWAN gateway to a cloud dashboard. It's the kind of bolt-on stack that often wouldn't pass as a scalable smart building solution. The system didn't replace the old sensors and couldn't control the BMS. But it could be installed without scheduling downtime, and it didn't need integration approval from IT since it sat on its own wireless network.
The maintenance team made manual BMS tweaks based on overlay alerts when conditions drifted out of range. Surgeon complaints dropped overnight. Daily contractor visits stopped. Cleary cited sub-12-month ROI and an estimated 10–15% HVAC savings, caveated as "not fully validated" since the project is recent.
Cleary was candid about meeting the building owner where they were at. "It's not an ideal solution by any means. It's not long term. There is plans to do a wider BMS upgrade within the hospital, but the funds aren't there. So it's a stop-gap really."
For the 87% of buildings that don't have the budget or attention for a proper technology upgrade, something is better than nothing.
Register for the next Nexus Labs event.
Sign up for the newsletter to get 5 stories like this per week:
This is a great piece!
I agree.