Moderna enables faster monitoring, response and decision-making with HiveMQ
Pharmaceutical and biotechnology company Moderna has been pioneering mRNA medicine through the advancement of its technology platform since 2010. Moderna's mRNA platform has enabled the development of vaccines and therapeutics across infectious diseases, cancer, rare diseases and more.
We rely on HiveMQ for secure, real-time data flow from external systems. It’s now a critical part of how we operate.
The foundation for the Air-France-KLM strategy is harnessing and accessing the power of the Group’s huge volumes of data for improved business decisions. They sought a reliable, scalable, and secure IoT messaging solution to help them modernize legacy services while managing vast amounts of IoT data for several expanding use cases.
Moderna’s Lab Operations team needed a secure, reliable way to bring critical building management data from an external vendor system into their own digital ecosystem.
Problem: No Real-time Visibility
Moderna opened a new manufacturing and research site in Massachusetts, and Lab Operations needed to integrate data from a third‑party building management system (BMS) - a non‑Moderna system - into Moderna’s own environment.
Not only was this the first time ingesting external building data of this type into Moderna’s digital landscape, the team were also doing so as part of a time‑sensitive new‑site launch, where reliable building data is essential to ongoing operations.
The success of the project would determine how Moderna accessed, monitored and analyzed building data going forward.
Prior to this project, accessing data from the external BMS was manual and slow. The team would request exports from the external system’s managers, and getting the data could take a day or two. There was no real‑time visibility, limiting monitoring and analysis.
When the new site came online, Moderna’s requirements became clear:
Reliability of message transport from an external vendor system into Moderna’s environment.
End‑to‑end encryption and cybersecurity compliance, with full buy‑in from Moderna’s internal cybersecurity team.
A solution that fit a non‑GxP environment but still met high internal standards.
A path to feed data into a historian and analytics tools for monitoring and predictive analysis.
There was also a foundational question to answer: Is it even possible to securely connect an external vendor system like this into their environment?
The project would move from proof of concept to first‑of‑its‑kind production deployment if that question could be convincingly answered.
Evaluating Options: MQTT Platforms and Protocol Choices
Moderna decided to standardize on MQTT as the protocol for this use case. Other approaches, such as OPC UA, were considered, but for this scenario the team found MQTT easier to implement and better suited to their requirements.
Maglaya’s team evaluated several MQTT platforms:
HiveMQ
EMQX
AWS IoT
Smaller/bundled brokers that ship with other systems (e.g., Ignition)
They assessed each platform against a clear set of criteria:
Reliability under Moderna’s expected load and patterns.
Encryption and security controls, aligned with internal cybersecurity policies.
Vendor/product track record and adoption across industries.
Total cost of ownership.
Ease of deployment and configuration, from POC through to production.
After extensive testing and comparisons, HiveMQ emerged as the best fit.
Maglaya, as the final decision maker for the platform, selected HiveMQ and secured cybersecurity approval for the target architecture. A proof of concept validated that secure, real-time data integration from external systems was achievable.
HiveMQ stood out during this phase for its reliability and significantly simpler configuration, enabling faster deployment and reducing operational complexity compared to alternatives.
We tested multiple MQTT platforms, and based on our comparisons, HiveMQ was the one that met our requirements for reliability, security, and ease of configuration.
Enabling Data-Driven Systems
With HiveMQ selected, Moderna implemented an architecture in which:
The external building management system publishes data via MQTT.
HiveMQ acts as the secure, reliable MQTT broker at the center of the integration.
Data flows from HiveMQ into Moderna’s historian, where it is used for:
Real‑time monitoring and visibility
Analytics
Predictive maintenance models, primarily consumed by the Facilities team
The project began as a proof of concept (POC) that evolved into a fully operational system, as testing proved the approach. Lessons from this testing and POC made the transition to production smoother, reducing risk at go‑live for the new site.
During the implementation process, the team worked closely with cybersecurity to validate architecture and encryption, ultimately securing full approval.
HiveMQ stood out for its reliability and ease of deployment compared to other platforms we evaluated.
The impact was immediate and structural. This shift fundamentally changed how operational data is used, enabling faster monitoring, response, and decision-making.
Data now transported through HiveMQ feeds directly into Moderna’s historian and analytics platform, enabling monitoring and operational analysis, predictive modeling by downstream teams and improved utilization of facility and system data. HiveMQ acts as the foundational layer that makes these capabilities possible.
About Moderna
Moderna is a biotechnology company focused on mRNA-based medicines, operating advanced research and production environments that depend on secure, reliable and compliant data systems.
