About Setpoint Building Automation

Setpoint is a building automation provider specializing in intelligent control systems for commercial and industrial facilities. Operating primarily on new construction projects, Setpoint installs and commissions building automation controllers that manage HVAC, energy, and environmental systems — often before any permanent infrastructure is in place.

With a growing portfolio of remotely managed sites, reliable connectivity is not a luxury for Setpoint — it is foundational to how their engineers deliver and maintain their services.

The Challenge: Connecting to Sites That Aren't Ready

New construction sites present a unique problem for building automation teams: there is simply no existing network infrastructure to work with. When Setpoint deploys control systems at these sites, their engineers need to remotely access, configure, and troubleshoot those controllers — often before the building is even operational.

Early on, Setpoint attempted to use consumer-grade routers provided directly by cellular carriers. This approach quickly revealed critical limitations:

• The routers lacked the security and IP address handling capabilities that Setpoint's systems required.
• Remote access was unreliable, forcing engineers to drive to sites for tasks that should have been solvable in minutes.
• There was no centralized way to monitor or manage multiple remote devices at once.

The operational cost was significant. Every on-site visit consumed technician time that could otherwise be spent serving multiple clients remotely. As Adrian Cecchetto, a key stakeholder at Setpoint, explained:

"One person is able to connect to multiple sites in a day — multiple sites in a 10-minute window if they wanted to do something quickly — or spend an entire day working on that site without any downtime in between for driving to each of those locations."
— Adrian Cecchetto, Setpoint Building Automation

The Solution: Industrial-Grade IoT Connectivity via National Wireless

National Wireless partnered with Setpoint to replace their consumer routers with purpose-built industrial cellular modems — first through Microhard, and subsequently upgraded to the Digi product line. This transition delivered meaningful improvements across security, reliability, and manageability.

Phase 1 — Microhard Modems

The initial deployment replaced consumer-grade hardware with Microhard industrial cell modems. This gave Setpoint the security capabilities and IP address control they needed to establish reliable, protected remote sessions with their controllers at construction sites across their portfolio.

Phase 2 — Digi Router Upgrade & Fleet Management

As technology evolved, National Wireless worked with Setpoint to retrofit their fleet with Digi cellular routers — a more advanced solution that introduced:

• VPN tunneling capability for enhanced security and future scalability.
• The Digi Remote Manager cloud portal, enabling Setpoint to monitor and manage their entire fleet of routers in real time.
• Centralized firmware updates and configuration management, eliminating the need to touch devices individually.

As Brian Bader of National Wireless described it:

"Adrian can now remotely manage the Digi routers that enable connectivity to the controllers — not only can Adrian's team remotely access the building automation controllers that are deployed, but Adrian can now remotely manage the entire infrastructure that makes that possible."
— Brian Bader, National Wireless

The Results

The impact of stable, secure remote connectivity has been substantial for Setpoint's operations:

• Technician efficiency: Engineers now serve multiple remote sites in the time it previously took to drive to and service one. Remote troubleshooting and configuration is handled from a single connection.
• Operational visibility: Setpoint can monitor the live state of building systems across their entire portfolio, enabling faster response times and better client service.
• Infrastructure confidence: With the Digi management portal, Setpoint has full visibility into the health of every modem in the field — firmware versions, connectivity status, and configuration — all in one place.
• Set it and forget it: The solution is stable enough that it largely runs itself. As Adrian noted, the best compliment a connectivity solution can receive is that the team forgets about it — because it just works.

"Once it was configured — yeah, we're kind of just cruising along here. We've had very, very few issues with the Digi stuff, at least for sure."
— Adrian Cecchetto, Setpoint Building Automation

Why National Wireless?

When asked whether he would recommend National Wireless to peers in the industry, Adrian's answer was unequivocal — and his reasoning cut to something more meaningful than hardware specifications:

"Hardware is hardware, but it's the servicing component. I can call Brian, I can email Brian and tell him what I need, and Brian takes care of whoever needs to deal with it on your end. That's the valuable part of all of this."
— Adrian Cecchetto, Setpoint Building Automation

The relationship between Setpoint and National Wireless spans over a decade — built on responsiveness, trust, and a shared commitment to keeping critical building systems connected and operational.