Every company has an AI roadmap.
Almost no building has one.
SQRD is the independent technology and AI consultancy for organisations that occupy space. We define what to deploy across your workplace, prove it in a live environment with real people, and write the specification so it gets adopted rather than installed.
Trusted on workplace and building technology by
and landmark developments across Asia Pacific
The problem
01 / 07Your AI strategy stops at the front door.
The building it runs in was specified by someone else.
Occupiers are further ahead on AI than the buildings they sit in, and the gap is widening. You have a data strategy, a governance model and a roadmap. The asset has a building management system nobody has logged into since handover.
That gap is where workplace technology projects die. The platform is selected, the business case is signed, and then it turns out the occupancy data lives with the landlord, the network cannot carry it, and the system that was going to feed it exports a weekly PDF.
None of that is a technology failure. It is a sequencing failure. The requirement was written after the product was chosen.
What we do for occupiers
02 / 07Workplace technology strategy and roadmaps
Which use cases are worth pursuing across your estate, in what order, and what the systems underneath have to support for each one to work. Sequenced by value and by readiness, not by vendor roadmap.
AI pilots in real spaces, with real people
Controlled deployments on a live floor, measured against criteria agreed before anything is installed. Past the novelty period, in real operating conditions, with a scale or stop recommendation at the end.
Platform selection and vendor neutral specification
We write the performance specification the market tenders against, then evaluate responses on evidence rather than presentation. We do not resell any of it.
Adoption, measurement and performance
Installed is not adopted. We define what good looks like before deployment, instrument it, and stay long enough to know whether it worked.
Who this is for
Heads of workplace, real estate and facilities. Workplace technology and IT leaders. Innovation teams with a portfolio to justify.
What we examine. The SQRD Stack.
03 / 07Before any workplace application is worth buying, four layers underneath it have to hold. Most workplace technology business cases assume all four and check none.
Systems
What is installed, what is planned, and what each system constrains.
What have we actually got?
Data
What each system produces, whether it is accessible, and how it gets out.
What can we actually see?
Integration
How systems and data connect. Point to point, or through one integration layer.
What will it cost to change this later?
Intelligence
Where AI genuinely improves operations and experience, once the layers below are sound.
Where does AI actually pay?
How we engage. Five stages.
04 / 07Occupiers usually arrive at stage 01 or stage 04. Either you have inherited an estate nobody has audited, or you have a technology you want proven before a portfolio commitment.
Assessment
Operational technology assessment
What have we actually got, and what will it let us do?
Strategy
AI and technology strategy for real estate
Where does AI actually pay here, and in what order?
Design
Systems and integration design
How do these systems connect without locking us in?
Pilot
AI pilots and proof of value
Does this work in our building, with our people?
Specification
Procurement specification and tender support
How do we buy this without being sold to?
Enter at any stage. Most clients start at 01.
Selected work
05 / 07Global investment bank
Financial services // Global scope
Assessment / Strategy / Design / Pilot / Specification
Global pharmaceutical client
Pharmaceutical, life sciences // Singapore and Asia Pacific
Assessment / Strategy / Specification
Global technology manufacturer
Technology manufacturing // Global scope
Strategy / Pilot
Client names are withheld where the engagement is covered by confidentiality. Happy to talk through any of these directly.
Why SQRD
06 / 07We do not sell the systems we specify.
There is no hardware line in our business, no integration arm, and no vendor commission. Our only product is the recommendation, which means it is the only thing we have to get right.
Vendor neutral
We specify what the building needs, then we help you take it to market and hold suppliers to it.
Specification led
We define the requirement before anyone selects a product, because the order matters and reversing it is expensive.
Delivery tested
Twenty five years and more than one hundred projects. Everything we recommend has to survive contact with a live building.
Questions we get asked
07 / 07We lease our space. How much can we actually change?
More than most occupiers assume, and less than the landlord's marketing implies. The assessment establishes exactly where the boundary sits: which systems you control, which the landlord controls, and which data you have a contractual right to. That boundary is usually the single most useful thing we produce.
Do we need to involve our landlord?
For anything touching base building systems, yes, and it goes better when the ask is specific. A defined data requirement backed by a technical rationale gets a different response than a general request for cooperation.
We already have a workplace platform. Is this still relevant?
Usually more so. The common problem is not the absence of a platform, it is a platform that cannot reach the data it needs. We establish what it is actually being fed and what it would take to feed it properly.
How does this fit with our IT and security teams?
They are in the room from the start. Operational technology and corporate IT converge in every one of these projects, and the ones that fail are the ones where that conversation happened after selection rather than before.
Can you work across a regional portfolio, not just one office?
Yes, and that is where the method pays hardest. The same three constraints usually repeat across every site, and nobody has seen them side by side. We assess a representative sample, then apply the method across the rest.
Tell us about the space, the asset, or the problem.
We will tell you honestly whether we are the right people for it.
If you own the asset rather than the other way round, there is a door for that. AI for buildings