Project Haystack
Project Haystack is a 501(c) non-profit founded in 2011 that develops and maintains an open-source semantic data standard and ontology for building automation and IoT, serving building owners, consultants, system integrators, and equipment manufacturers through membership, biennial conferences, and publications.
- Company typePrivate
- Founded2011
- HeadquartersGlen Allen, United States
- Headcount1–10
- GTM typeB2B
- OfferingSoftware
What Project Haystack does
Project Haystack is a 501(c) non-profit founded in 2011 and headquartered in Glen Allen, Virginia, that develops and maintains an open-source data standardization framework for building automation and IoT. The organization's core technology stack includes a domain-specific ontology, defined data types, file formats (Zinc, JSON, Trio, CSV, and RDF), and an HTTP API, all licensed under the Academic Free License 3.0. In May 2025, Project Haystack released version 5, which introduced the Xeto Schema Language and RDF integration to formalize the ontology and enable semantic-web interoperability. The standard is used by building owners, consulting engineers, system integrators, and equipment manufacturers to tag and exchange building equipment data across heterogeneous systems.
The organization serves a four-sided community spanning building owners, consultants, system integrators, and manufacturers. Notable members referenced include Alperia, Midea, and other international firms, indicating adoption across both North American and overseas markets. Project Haystack publishes Connections Magazine (circulation of 8,000+ readers) and hosts the biennial Haystack Connect conference, which functions as the community's primary in-person gathering.
Project Haystack's revenue model is a non-profit membership and event structure. Income is derived from tiered membership dues (Sustaining, Principal, and Associate levels), biennial Haystack Connect conference registrations and sponsorships, and Connections Magazine advertising. The organization operates with a small staff (1–10 employees per public profiles) and is governed as a community standards body rather than a venture-backed technology vendor.
Project Haystack firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- Project Haystack
- Legal name
- Project Haystack Corporation
- Website
- https://project-haystack.org
- Company type
- Private
- Founded year
- 2011
- Operating status
- Operating
- Headcount range
- 1–10 employees
- Short description
- Project Haystack is a 501(c) non-profit founded in 2011 that develops and maintains an open-source semantic data standard and ontology for building automation and IoT, serving building owners, consultants, system integrators, and equipment manufacturers through membership, biennial conferences, and publications.
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
Project Haystack industry classification
Industry- Product category
- IoT Data Standards
- NAICS
- Computing Infrastructure Providers, Data Processing, Web Hosting, and Related Services (51821)
- SIC
- Services-Computer Programming, Data Processing, Etc. (7370)
- akta.pro primary industry
- Metadata, Catalog & Semantic Layer for Data Platforms (HDAEABAJ)
Keywords
Where Project Haystack is headquartered
LocationHeadquarters
- HQ city
- Glen Allen
- HQ country
- United States
- HQ region
- North America
Offices1 record
Markets served
Project Haystack business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2B
- Offering type
- Software
- Cost components
- Personnel, Operations, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Others
Revenue model
- Membership Fees: Project Haystack is a 501(c) non-profit organization that generates revenue through corporate membership fees. Associate Member companies join to support the organization's standards for semantic modeling and tagging of device and equipment data.
- Conference Revenue: Biennial Haystack Connect conference generates revenue through attendee registration, sponsorhips, and exhibition fees. The 2025 conference was held in Washington D.C.
Pricing tiers
| Model | Billing | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Freemium | Others | Open Source - Free Access |
Go-to-market motion3 records
Distribution channels3 records
Marketing channels8 records
Project Haystack product offering
Product offeringCore offering
Project Haystack standardizes semantic data models and web services to make it easier to unlock value from IoT data generated by smart devices in homes, buildings, factories, and cities. It provides an open ontology, data types, multi-format encoding (Zinc, JSON, Trio, CSV, RDF), an HTTP API, and a reference implementation framework (Haxall) for tagging and exchanging building automation and IoT data.
Product overview
Project Haystack is an open source suite of technologies for modeling IoT data, organized around a core stack of five components: Data Types (kinds) provide the foundational data modeling primitives; File Types (Zinc, JSON, Trio, CSV, RDF) enable interoperable data exchange; the HTTP API enables RPC-based communication; the Ontology provides standard vocabularies for buildings, equipment, and sensors; and Defs formalize the definition system. The ecosystem includes Haxall (the reference implementation framework with defc compiler), Connections Magazine (community publication), and Haystack 5 introduced Xeto as a new schema specification language with RDF integration.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Products and services
- Haystack Data Types (Kinds)
Companies that use Project Haystack
Customer profileSegments3 records
Ideal customer profiles3 records
Project Haystack technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- Yes
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Feature8 records
Project Haystack partnerships and signals
Strategic signalPartnerships
Ten partnerships are on record, tiered core, minor and moderate.
- J2 InnovationscoreJ2 Innovations is a key contributor leading technical webinars on Haystack 5 and Xeto for Python Developers. Co-presents technical content at conferences.
- Air-TraXX B.V.minorAir-TraXX B.V. joined as an Associate Member in June 2024, demonstrating support for Project Haystack's standards for semantic modeling and tagging of device and equipment data.
- Innon Energy Ltd.minorInnon Energy Ltd. joined as an Associate Member in June 2024, supporting the organization's standards for semantic modeling and tagging.
- Alperia GroupminorAlperia Group became an Associate Member in 2023, joining the growing global membership of the organization.
- MideaminorMidea joined as an Associate Member in 2023, representing growing international support for the Haystack standards.
- Nanjing Chinwell TechnologyminorNanjing Chinwell Technology joined as an Associate Member in 2023, expanding the organization's presence in China.
- OneSight SolutionsminorOneSight Solutions joined as an Associate Member in 2023.
- SkyFoundrycoreSkyFoundry is a key contributor to the Project Haystack ecosystem. Technical Lead Brian Frank serves as Technical Lead of Project Haystack. SkyFoundry leads technical sessions on Haystack 5 and Xeto.
- Fantom FactorymoderateFantom Factory provides 'Haystack Essentials' eLearning course for training developers on Haystack tagging. Partners with Project Haystack for educational content distribution.
- Haystack Connect ConferencecoreBiennial conference at haystackconnect.org bringing together the Project Haystack community. The 2025 event was held at The Westin Washington, D.C. City Center.
Scale indicators3 records
Recent moves5 records
Expansion highlights5 records
Project Haystack competitors and assessment
Company assessmentDirect peers
- Brick Schema (Brick Consortium): Brick is an open-source metadata schema for buildings, providing a uniform vocabulary for sensors, equipment, and spaces. It is the most direct semantic-standards competitor to Project Haystack, addressing the same pain point of building data interoperability.
- RealEstateCore: RealEstateCore is an open-source ontology for the real estate and built environment, covering buildings, spaces, and equipment with linked-data semantics. It directly overlaps with Project Haystack's ontology scope and competes for the same building-data modeling audience.
- Google Digital Buildings: Google's Digital Buildings project is an open-source schema and dataset for representing building metadata, sensor data, and HVAC systems. It is a direct semantic-standards peer with the backing of a hyperscaler, raising the bar for community-led alternatives.
- SkyFoundry: SkyFoundry is a commercial provider of building IoT analytics software built natively on the Haystack standard; its founder Brian Frank also serves as Project Haystack's Technical Lead. It is a direct peer that both extends and commercially implements the Haystack ecosystem.
- J2 Innovations: J2 Innovations develops the FIN Framework (FIN/Stack) building automation software that natively supports Haystack tagging. It is a direct peer and core contributor to the Haystack ecosystem, with significant overlap in target customers (system integrators, building owners).
Broad incumbents
- Microsoft Azure Digital Twins (DTDL): Microsoft's Digital Twins Definition Language (DTDL) provides semantic modeling for IoT and built-environment digital twins within the Azure ecosystem. It is a broader incumbent offering overlapping semantic-modeling capabilities, bundled into a hyperscale cloud platform.
- FIWARE Foundation: FIWARE is an open-source IoT platform with NGSI-based semantic interoperability, supported by the European Commission. It addresses a similar IoT data harmonization need as Haystack but as part of a much broader smart-city and IoT stack.
- ASHRAE (Standard 223P): ASHRAE is developing Standard 223P for semantic labeling of building equipment and data, directly addressing the same problem space as Project Haystack. As an established industry-standards body, ASHRAE is a high-relevance incumbent peer with strong institutional pull.
Emerging players
- W3C Web of Things (WoT): The W3C Web of Things Working Group defines semantic vocabularies, thing descriptions, and discovery mechanisms for IoT. It overlaps with Haystack's semantic-modeling goals at the broader IoT layer, complementing and partially competing with Haystack's building-specific ontology.
- ETSI (SAREF Ontology): ETSI's SAREF is a reference ontology for smart appliances and IoT domains, providing standardized semantic models. It is an emerging peer pursuing adjacent semantic-interoperability goals that could converge with or compete against Haystack's built-environment focus.
Market position
Strengths4 records
Weaknesses5 records
Competitive moat4 records
Key risks6 records
Key highlights7 records
Customer concentration
Project Haystack social profiles
Digital presenceProject Haystack financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
Project Haystack leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
Profiles5 records
Project Haystack funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds
Investors
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Project Haystack M&A and investment
M&A and investmentM&A
Investments
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Frequently asked questions about Project Haystack
What does Project Haystack do?
Project Haystack standardizes semantic data models and web services to make it easier to unlock value from IoT data generated by smart devices in homes, buildings, factories, and cities. It provides an open ontology, data types, multi-format encoding (Zinc, JSON, Trio, CSV, RDF), an HTTP API, and a reference implementation framework (Haxall) for tagging and exchanging building automation and IoT data.
Is Project Haystack a public or private company?
Project Haystack is a private company. It is classified as nonprofit foundation owned and is currently operating.
When was Project Haystack founded?
Project Haystack was founded in 2011. It employs 1 to 10 people.
Where is Project Haystack based?
Project Haystack is headquartered in Glen Allen, United States, in the North America region.
How does Project Haystack make money?
Two revenue lines are on record. Membership Fees are the primary driver. The others are conference Revenue.
Who are Project Haystack's main competitors?
Direct peers on record are Brick Schema (Brick Consortium), RealEstateCore, Google Digital Buildings, SkyFoundry and J2 Innovations. Broad incumbents are Microsoft Azure Digital Twins (DTDL), FIWARE Foundation and ASHRAE (Standard 223P). Emerging players are W3C Web of Things (WoT) and ETSI (SAREF Ontology).
Does Project Haystack have an API?
Yes. Haystack HTTP API provides a simple RPC-based protocol for exchanging data between servers and devices using grids encoded in Zinc, JSON, Trio, CSV, or RDF file formats. Standard operations include read (query entity data), hisRead (read historized time-series), hisWrite (push time-series data), and watchSub (subscribe to real-time sensor data). Authentication uses pluggable SCRAM-based protocol. Developer documentation is at project-haystack.org/doc/docHaystack/HttpApi.
What industry is Project Haystack in?
Project Haystack's product category is IoT Data Standards. Its primary akta.pro industry code is HDAEABAJ, Metadata, Catalog & Semantic Layer for Data Platforms. Its NAICS code is 51821 and its SIC code is 7370.