What is Clockworks?

Clockworks Analytics is the world's leading fault detection and diagnostics (FDD) platform and the foundation for AI-powered facilities. It plugs into existing building automation systems, analyzes thousands of data points from every piece of equipment, and pinpoints the highest-impact performance issues, each with a root-cause diagnosis and a recommended action.

Those diagnostics build a validated health record for every asset, which serves as an intelligence layer for maintenance, energy, capital planning, compliance, and the rest of the facilities organization. Clockworks monitors 4,300 buildings across more than 30 countries.

Clockworks has normalized the largest connected asset portfolio in the world against a single, physics-based global information model. That scale is what makes its diagnostics the most accurate root-cause diagnostics on the market:

• Largest modeled portfolio: more than 600,000 pieces of equipment, including 27,000+ air handlers, 5,000+ chillers, and 380,000+ pieces of zone equipment, in 4,300 buildings across 30+ countries
• Deepest diagnostics: 50+ purpose-built expert systems, refined for more than fifteen years, with no custom rule-writing
• Proven outcomes: $241 million saved, 630,000 tonnes of carbon avoided, and 70,000+ tasks completed by customers
• Built for AI: a validated data foundation that AI tools can trust, instead of raw tags and trends

Every new building onboarded makes the global model smarter for every customer, so the lead compounds over time.

Fault detection and diagnostics is software that continuously analyzes building system data to find equipment that isn't operating as intended. Fault detection flags that something is wrong. Diagnostics explains why, identifying the likely root cause such as a leaking valve, a stuck damper, or a faulty sensor.

Clockworks focuses on the diagnostics half. Instead of producing a stream of alarms, it groups related symptoms on a piece of equipment into a single finding, explains the likely causes, and ranks it against everything else in the portfolio.

Clockworks serves building owners and operators across eight industries:

• Higher education
• K-12
• Healthcare
• Life sciences and pharmaceutical
• Corporate real estate
• Commercial real estate
• Manufacturing
• Government

It also serves facility management companies and mechanical and controls service providers that deliver services in those buildings. Public case studies include MIT, Kaiser Permanente, Amgen, the University of Iowa, ISS, and Wendel.

Inside those organizations, the day-to-day users are maintenance managers, controls and BAS engineers, energy and sustainability leads, asset and capital planners, and facilities executives.

Most facilities teams have far more building data than time to review it. Faults like simultaneous heating and cooling, economizers that aren't economizing, or equipment running outside its schedule can waste energy for months without anyone noticing.

Clockworks reviews every piece of connected equipment every day and gives the team a ranked punch list, so they spend their time on the issues with the biggest impact on energy cost, occupant comfort, and equipment reliability.

No. Clockworks sits on top of your existing building automation system (BAS or BMS) and reads its data. It doesn't change control sequences or setpoints. Your BAS keeps running the building; Clockworks tells you where the building isn't running the way it was designed to.

Clockworks Analytics was founded in 2008 within MIT's Building Science Department. Its diagnostic engine has been refined for more than fifteen years across thousands of buildings, and every building onboarded makes the shared model more accurate for every customer.

An AI-powered facility is one where AI assistants and agents help run operations: deciding what to work on today, which maintenance can be deferred, which assets to replace, and where energy is being wasted. People stay in charge, but AI does much of the analysis and reporting that used to take engineers and consultants weeks or months.

That only works when the AI has accurate, structured knowledge of every asset and how it is performing. Clockworks provides that knowledge.

Most building data is unstructured. Point names are inconsistent, assets are duplicated, and as-builts live in spreadsheets and paper drawings. Put AI directly on top of that and it turns basic data into more noise.

Clockworks validates every layer before AI touches it:

• Connectivity: every asset streaming, with gaps documented
• Basic data: points tagged and trended
• Information model: equipment types, relationships, and system context
• Expert system insights: root-cause diagnostics, KPIs, and virtual meters
• Trusted asset health: a validated record AI can reason over

The result is engineering-grade insight on transparent, validated data. AI-wrapper software that skips these layers can't provide that foundation.

Clockworks creates a lifetime health record for every piece of equipment. Instead of each team working from its own spreadsheets and systems, every function draws on the same validated asset intelligence:

• Maintenance management: balance reactive, preventive, condition-based, and predictive strategies
• Asset management: decide replacement timing, system sizing, and capital plans with evidence
• Building automation: systematically find and fix BAS and sequence issues
• Energy and sustainability: deliver targeted, measurable, defensible savings
• Risk management: assess operational, compliance, and business risk
• Compliance management: manage deviations and keep condition records for regulators
• Business management: connect asset health to outcomes like patient satisfaction, manufacturing reliability, student outcomes, and profitability

Because it is one layer, a fault found by the controls team, the cost the energy team sees, and the asset condition the capital planner uses all come from the same source of truth.

Sprocket is the AI assistant built into Clockworks. You ask a question in plain language, such as "What should my team focus on today?" or "Which critical spaces are at risk?", and Sprocket answers using your portfolio's equipment, fault, task, and performance data, with a recommended next step.

It also handles complex research and reporting that used to take consultants months, such as reviewing two years of supply air temperature reset performance across 23 air handlers and producing a 51-page report.

• Prioritize the day. Ask what the team should focus on and get the top findings ranked by avoidable cost, with the next step for each.
• Reduce maintenance work. Review an ASHRAE 180 program and see which tasks can run continuously through analytics, shift to condition-based dispatch, or be safely deferred. In one analysis, that was 69% of the task load.
• Audit a portfolio. Run an energy audit summary across a campus. One analysis of 40 buildings found $340,867 in avoidable cost, 91% of it fixable through control sequences rather than capital projects.
• Get context fast. Pull the history, open tasks, and current diagnostics for any piece of equipment, with an AI summary of the likely root cause and repair order.
• Check that fixes held. See which equipment is faulting again after tasks were closed, and what the recurrence is costing.

Yes. Clockworks connects to AI assistants such as Claude through the Model Context Protocol (MCP), and to business intelligence tools through the Clockworks KPI API. Your own AI tools and agents work from the same validated diagnostics and asset health data your team sees in the platform, instead of raw BMS points.

No. The core diagnostics come from physics-based expert systems that encode real engineering knowledge, not a black-box statistical model. Findings are explainable: each one shows the trend data and engineering logic behind it. Generative AI, through Sprocket and connected tools, sits on top of those results to make them faster to query, summarize, and act on.

Sprocket answers from validated Clockworks data: the information model, expert-system diagnostics, avoidable cost calculations, and task history for your portfolio. Because every diagnostic is traceable to trend data and engineering calculations, your team can check the evidence behind any AI answer before acting on it.

Clockworks follows five steps:

• Connect. A software gateway inside the building reads the existing BMS and meters and sends thousands of data points to the Clockworks cloud every five minutes.
• Model. Clockworks builds a digital model of every piece of equipment from its data points, control sequences, and mechanical schedules.
• Diagnose. More than 50 expert systems analyze each piece of equipment continuously, the way a commissioning engineer would.
• Prioritize. Every issue is scored 0 to 10 for energy, comfort, and maintenance impact, and an energy model puts a dollar value on the avoidable cost.
• Act. Your team works from a ranked punch list, creates tasks, and verifies that fixes held.

The information model is a single, machine-readable way to describe every asset in every building. Building data is rarely standardized: the same supply air temperature sensor might be named twenty different ways. Clockworks normalizes it into one model that captures equipment types, point types, equipment relationships (which AHU serves which VAVs, which plant serves which AHU), and calculated values.

That model covers more than 600,000 pieces of equipment and classifies over 5.8 million data points daily. It is what lets Clockworks diagnose root causes across a whole system instead of flagging isolated symptoms.

Expert systems are a form of AI that encodes engineering knowledge, such as thermodynamics, heat transfer, and control logic, instead of guessing statistically. Clockworks has more than 50 of them, each purpose-built for a system type such as air handlers, chillers, boilers, or zone equipment.

Because the reasoning is based on physics, every diagnostic can be traced back to the trend data and calculations that produced it. Your engineers can check the work.

No. Clockworks applies its diagnostics automatically based on the equipment type and configuration captured in the information model. There is no custom rule-writing per building. When Clockworks improves an analysis, every customer gets the improvement without reconfiguration.

Each piece of equipment gets three independent priority scores from 0 to 10:

• Energy, driven by avoidable cost
• Comfort, driven by how far spaces drift from their setpoints
• Maintenance, driven by fault severity and risk to the equipment

Teams can sort the whole portfolio by whichever matters most that day, and findings are bundled into the top priorities for the day, week, and month.

Clockworks uses engineering models specific to each fault type. It compares actual operation with expected operation, converts the difference into wasted energy using the equipment's ratings, and applies your building's utility rates. The result is the dollar value of the waste for the period analyzed and a projected annual saving if the issue is fixed.

The calculation and the underlying trend data are visible in every diagnostic report, so the number can be verified.

False positives usually come from rules that don't know how a piece of equipment is supposed to run. Clockworks models the intended sequence of operations and mechanical configuration for each piece of equipment, so it can tell a real fault from intended operation. It also accounts for data quality, flagging missing or out-of-range sensors as their own findings instead of reporting faults based on bad data.

Across its portfolio, Clockworks customers have saved $241 million and 630,000 tonnes of carbon, and completed more than 70,000 tasks. Published examples include:

• MIT: $1,000,000 in annual savings across campus
• University of Iowa: $600,000 in savings in the first six months
• Wendel: $616,000 in annual energy savings for a private university client
• Kaiser Permanente: 849 tasks completed in a three-week maintenance blitz
• A leading pharmaceutical manufacturer: nearly €500,000 in energy savings at its Singapore site

Clockworks finds operational waste that the BAS doesn't alarm on: simultaneous heating and cooling, economizer faults, missing setpoint resets, equipment running when buildings are unoccupied, and leaking valves. Much of this is fixed with control sequence changes rather than capital projects, which makes the savings fast and inexpensive to capture. Avoidable cost is tracked before and after each fix, so savings are measurable and defensible.

Yes. Clockworks gives teams a continuous health record for every piece of equipment, which lets them move work off the calendar. In one ASHRAE 180 analysis, 69% of preventive maintenance task instances could be automated by continuous diagnostics, converted to condition-based dispatch, or safely deferred while equipment stayed healthy.

Clients who want to go further can join the Condition-Based Maintenance program.

Yes. Comfort is one of the three priority scores, and Clockworks tracks zone temperature, humidity, airflow, and pressurization against design intent. Hospitals use it to watch critical spaces such as operating rooms, pharmacies, and isolation rooms for low air changes, humidity excursions, and exhaust airflow problems. The Critical Compliance & Critical Spaces program builds on this.

Every facilities function. Maintenance managers, controls engineers, energy and sustainability leads, asset and capital planners, compliance teams, and executives all work from the same validated asset intelligence, each for their own decisions.

Clockworks Programs are structured, co-developed initiatives that take clients beyond finding faults and closing tasks. Each program starts with a real client challenge, such as a manual compliance process or a calendar-based maintenance plan, and builds the reports, views, diagnostics, and automation needed to change how the team works.

Every program answers the same questions: what problem it solves, what data it needs, how the work flows, what proves it is working, who needs to see it, and how the value is counted in dollars. The goal is better facilities at a lower cost, measured across energy savings, better performance, extended asset life, and maintenance efficiency.

Clockworks currently runs six programs, all co-developed with clients:

• Condition-Based Maintenance (CbM): move maintenance from the calendar to the condition
• Condition-Based Asset (CapEx) Planning: time replacements on total cost of ownership
• Critical Compliance & Critical Spaces: prove and maintain environmental compliance in critical spaces
• Energy & Sustainability Compliance: compliance-first energy reporting against an accepted baseline
• Building Optimization: whole-building savings beyond the fault list
• Data Connectivity: surfaces data gaps and their root causes, and supports every other program

The Condition-Based Maintenance program moves maintenance from the calendar to the condition, so work happens when equipment actually needs it. It provides findings with clear causes and recommendations, and it is piloting automation that creates or suppresses work orders based on equipment condition, starting with filter degradation.

Condition-based is not deferred maintenance. Some work moves sooner to protect the asset, such as changing a filter weeks before its scheduled PM because fan energy is climbing. Other work moves later when the data shows the equipment is healthy, saving labor and materials. Value is measured as labor redirected to higher-value work, PM time removed, and contracted scope right-sized.

The CapEx Planning program helps owners decide when to replace equipment based on its condition and its total cost of ownership over its whole life, not its age. Replacing too early spends capital on life the asset still had; replacing too late means paying for the failure at a worse price. How the asset is run in between moves both dates.

Value is measured as asset life gained through good maintenance, replacements deferred with confidence, and replacements brought forward when upkeep exceeds the cost of replacing.

The Critical Compliance & Critical Spaces program helps healthcare and life sciences organizations prove and maintain environmental compliance in spaces such as operating rooms, pharmacies, isolation rooms, and labs. It automates manual compliance checks, keeps reliable historical records for surveys and audits, and reduces the impact of downtime.

The program began as a way to replace manual compliance work and has grown into an optimized maintenance program. Upcoming capabilities include particulate concentration, excursion severity, and office comfort. Value is measured as revenue and operational losses avoided, comfort and productivity improved, and SLA penalties reduced.

The Energy & Sustainability Compliance program delivers compliance-first energy reporting so clients can meet regulatory requirements such as building performance standards and benchmarking mandates. It starts by proving the baseline, because that is what the regulator accepts, what the client trusts, and what every later saving is measured against.

Today it includes updated utility metering scope and meter comparisons with data-quality awareness. Value is measured as energy savings at the meter, demand and rate-structure waste, and benchmarking penalties avoided.

Building Optimization looks beyond individual equipment faults to how systems relate, which zones drive a system's behavior, and which sequences can run more efficiently. It currently includes a ventilation-system diagnostic that names the zones driving the system, with recommended solutions and associated savings coming next.

Data Connectivity supports every other program. Points go offline, communication drops, and building scope changes, so the program surfaces where data is incomplete and why, and gives clients the tools to reach root cause. A communications fault deserves the same diagnosis and fix as a failed damper.

Clients can apply, or be nominated by their Technical Account Manager, Partner Account Manager, or Service Engineer. Clockworks reviews each candidate against published criteria: a real workflow to change, the data the program needs, a named person with time to take part, and fit with what the program is testing at that stage.

Programs move through four stages: pilot, beta co-build, beta validate, and established. Early stages ask more of the client, such as frequent working sessions and honest feedback, in exchange for shaping the result. Established programs become part of what Clockworks delivers with no extra commitment. Clients whose basics are solid and who are looking for what comes next are usually ready.

Clockworks Professional Services help facilities teams turn diagnostics into completed work and measurable value. There are three service levels:

• Core (train and support): included for every client. Expert user training, data model optimization, API access, unlimited support requests, custom dashboard development hours, and quarterly impact reviews.
• Plus (manage): a Clockworks engineer regularly reviews diagnostics, creates and prioritizes the most impactful tasks, and documents each issue for faster on-site resolution.
• Premium (drive success): a dedicated Service Engineer acts as an extension of the facilities team, co-defining KPIs, supporting process change such as the move to condition-based maintenance, validating fixes, and quantifying full project value.

Additional offerings include task management, additional value calculations such as lifecycle and deep energy savings analysis, CMMS integration support, custom dashboards, and implementation of Clockworks Programs.

Clients using Professional Services typically recover their services investment in four to six months. Examples include:

• National healthcare provider, 30M+ sq ft: 230% ROI, four-month payback, and 2,205 tonnes of carbon reduced, meeting stretch goals for the first time
• Global pharmaceutical manufacturer, 3.5M sq ft: 260% ROI under a fully managed model and a 9.5× increase in annual cost avoidance
• Children's hospital, 800K sq ft: 310% ROI, four-month payback, and 4.5× faster task completion

In 2025, tasks completed with Clockworks Service Engineers generated more than $8.4 million in value.

Many teams self-perform with the Core level, which every client receives. Self-performing works best when the organization has a dedicated user or team whose job includes reviewing diagnostics, creating tasks, and managing their completion.

Plus or Premium makes sense when the team has little time to triage, when identified savings are not being captured, or when leadership has specific energy, carbon, maintenance, or compliance targets to hit. You can change service levels as your program matures.

BAS alarms trigger when a single value crosses a threshold. They don't know whether the equipment is running as designed, and they don't explain causes or cost. Clockworks analyzes how whole systems behave over time, diagnoses why, and ranks issues by their impact, so teams act on a short list instead of muting a long one.

Many FDD tools rely on point tagging plus custom if-then rules configured building by building. That approach tends to produce "smarter alarms" that overwhelm teams, rules that break when equipment configurations vary, and frequent false positives. Clockworks combines tagging with sequences of operation and mechanical schedules in one information model, applies a global analysis engine across every building, and returns uniform diagnostics regardless of the underlying equipment mix.

Rules-based tools also tend to leave organizations with siloed buildings and data, because each building has its own set of rules that were configured, tuned, and maintained separately. Results can't be compared fairly from one site to the next. Clockworks is cloud-based and built on a single global information model, so every building is analyzed the same way. That lets you view performance at the portfolio level, whether you have one building or thousands across different countries.

Many newer platforms put a generative AI layer on top of raw tags and trends. Without a validated equipment model and engineering diagnostics underneath, that AI turns messy data into confident noise. Clockworks provides the foundation first, with a validated information model and expert-system diagnostics, and then adds AI on top of it.

Retro-commissioning is a point-in-time study: an engineer reviews a building, savings are captured, and performance drifts again. Clockworks applies the same kind of engineering analysis continuously to every piece of connected equipment, so drift is caught as it happens and fixes can be verified afterward.

Clockworks works with any system that supports open data protocols, including BACnet/IP, BACnet MS/TP, Modbus, MQTT, OPC, and REST, XML, or JSON interfaces. Clockworks has integrated with systems from Siemens, Johnson Controls (Metasys), Honeywell, Trane (Tracer), Automated Logic (WebCTRL), Distech, Delta, Sauter, and others.

No new sensors are required. Clockworks uses the data your BMS and meters already collect. A lightweight software gateway, typically a small virtual machine or device on the building network, reads that data and sends it to the cloud over outbound HTTPS. No inbound firewall ports or on-premise servers are needed.

Timelines depend mainly on portfolio size and how quickly documentation and network access come together. Many organizations start with a focused pilot of a few buildings and then roll out to the rest of the portfolio in phased waves, prioritizing the buildings with the highest energy spend or known issues. Because Clockworks is cloud-based, there's no infrastructure to provision.

• Access to the BMS network for the software gateway
• Mechanical schedules (equipment ratings and capacities)
• Sequences of operation for major equipment
• HVAC system diagrams showing which equipment serves which
• Utility rates for electricity, gas, and any district energy
• An engineering contact to help validate the first diagnostics

Clockworks has onboarded buildings with complete documentation and buildings with very little. The onboarding team works with what's available.

Yes. Tasks created from diagnostics can be pushed to maintenance management systems as work orders, with status flowing back. Clockworks has established integrations with platforms such as Corrigo and Flowpath, and its REST API supports custom integrations with others, including ServiceNow and Maximo.

Yes. The Clockworks KPI API gives programmatic access to diagnostics, equipment, buildings, tasks, and trend data for use in Power BI, Tableau, and custom applications.

• Hosted on Microsoft Azure
• Outbound-only HTTPS from site to cloud; no inbound firewall ports
• Encryption in transit (TLS 1.2+) and at rest
• Role-based access control, single sign-on via SAML 2.0, and multi-factor authentication
• Logical isolation between customer environments
• Regular penetration testing and maintained business continuity and disaster recovery plans

Clockworks supports detailed security reviews for enterprise customers.

No. Clockworks reads data from your BMS. It does not write setpoints or modify control sequences. Your team decides what to change.

Clockworks processes operational building data: equipment telemetry, sensor readings, control signals, and meter data. It isn't designed to collect personal information. Customer data is not shared with other customers or third parties, and Clockworks supports GDPR requirements, including data processing agreements.

Clockworks is an annual subscription based on the amount of equipment monitored, not square footage, data points, or users, plus a one-time onboarding fee for setup and configuration. The subscription includes unlimited users, hosting and data storage, platform updates, support, and training. Contact the Clockworks team for a quote based on your portfolio.

Each customer has a named Technical Account Manager who runs regular review meetings, tracks results, and helps the team turn diagnostics into completed work. A Technical Operations Center monitors data quality and connectivity across connected buildings. Support tickets are unlimited, and diagnostics improve continuously with no action needed from your team.

Yes. Onboarding includes live training on navigating the platform, interpreting diagnostics, and managing tasks, tailored to different roles. On-demand courses and refresher sessions are available afterward. Customers can also join the Clockworks Community of Practice to share approaches with peers.

No. Clockworks explains each issue and its likely causes in plain terms, so technicians can act on findings without specialist analysis. Teams that don't have the staff to work the list themselves can partner with a Clockworks-certified service provider.

Traditional service agreements sell hours: a technician visits on a calendar and works through a checklist, whether or not the equipment needs it. Clients see a break/fix contractor, and the provider competes on price. Fault detection and diagnostics changes the unit of value from time on site to outcomes delivered.

With Clockworks, a service provider knows every day which equipment in each client's building is underperforming, why, and what it costs. That makes three things possible that a checklist can't:

• Targeted work: technicians arrive knowing the root cause and fix the highest-impact issues first, instead of hunting through BMS alarms and trend graphs
• Proof of results: every fix is verified in the data, so the provider can show the client avoided cost, comfort, and reliability improvements rather than hours logged
• Ongoing, defensible revenue: continuous diagnostics surface new, justified work and support longer, higher-value agreements

The shift is from reactive, commodity service to proactive, consultative service, where the provider is seen as a strategic advisor rather than a vendor.

• Better service quality: technicians act proactively on diagnosed issues instead of a fixed or seasonal schedule
• Stronger client relationships: solution-oriented technicians become trusted advisors, backed by data the client can see
• More revenue: remote analysis, standard procedures across field offices, and more pull-through work from justified findings
• Leverage for scarce talent: a senior technician's judgment scales across a portfolio, and newer technicians get a prioritized, diagnosed work queue, which helps firms facing a shortage of skilled labor

Most providers move through four levels:

• Level 0, traditional PM: calendar-based visits; technicians review BMS alarms
• Level 1, enhanced PM: fixing the top issues from Clockworks is added to each visit, and routine checks are demoted. This is where most partners start.
• Level 2, on-demand proactive service: daily diagnostics drive client service requests and pull-through work
• Level 3, building operations center: centralized, partner-branded remote monitoring across the client portfolio, dispatching to in-house teams, the partner's own trades, and other vendors, with client dashboards for avoidable cost and energy, comfort, and maintenance scores

Service agreements can evolve alongside, from ad hoc time-and-materials work, to a pre-approved budget for issues found, to full-service agreements where routine fixes are covered on detection.

LONG Building Technologies, a mechanical, controls, and security contractor serving seven western U.S. states, built a dedicated FDD-based service line on Clockworks. Across 102 buildings, LONG has:

• completed 661 tasks, delivering $550,000 in annual energy savings for clients
• earned 66% higher revenue per service agreement
• signed agreements that run 50% longer than traditional service contracts

LONG also found that clients who received dedicated service support alongside the software saw a 76% improvement rate in task resolution, compared with 27% for clients who used the tool on their own.

The Clockworks Partner Program is built for service organizations committed to transforming their service business. Partners don't simply resell Clockworks; they use it as a tool to create a new type of service that delivers more value to their clients.

Partners can start with a single proof-of-value project at one client site and scale to multi-site strategic partnerships. Clockworks and the partner jointly identify target accounts, review each account's current services and relationship, and build a partner-led business case that both sides use to measure success and expand.

• Strategy: workshops to define the service model and expected client impact
• Sales: a partner-branded demo site, pricing tools, pitch decks, service agreement templates, RFP support, and direct help on early deals
• Onboarding: IT and security review support, BMS guides, and dedicated project management. Clockworks owns software configuration quality.
• Training and delivery: certification training, program training for condition-based maintenance, critical space monitoring, and strategic energy management, Level 2 support, and an open REST API
• Marketing: joint press releases, co-created case studies, and partner promotion
• People: a dedicated partner manager, plus Clockworks Professional Services when a partner needs extra capacity

Clockworks Certified Partners are service providers that have proven platform expertise and a track record of measurable client outcomes. Certification recognizes partners against clear benchmarks for analyst training, completed tasks, and persisted avoided costs.

Increasingly, yes. The 2021 International Energy Conservation Code (IECC) requires fault detection and diagnostics in new buildings over 100,000 square feet, and LEED v4 awards points for monitoring-based commissioning. For service providers, that makes FDD a service clients will need, not just a differentiator.