Data Center Subcontractors: A 2026 Guide for Lenders

Data center subcontractors are the trade firms a general contractor hires to build the facility: electrical, mechanical, crane and rigging, precast, site work and more. For equipment lenders, that's where the deals sit. The hyperscaler pays for the building and the general contractor runs the job, but the subcontractors bring their own fleets. Many of them show up by name in public records around the time they mobilize: FAA crane filings, city trade permits, and state stormwater permits.

That matters more this year than last. Data centers are now carrying private nonresidential construction. Census Bureau figures put data center construction at a $75.2 billion annual rate in July 2026, up 57.2% from a year earlier. Take data centers out and the rest of private nonresidential construction fell 7.3% over the same period.

Last updated: September 28, 2026.

Key takeaways

• The borrower is the subcontractor: the owner funds the building. The trade contractors doing the lifting, concrete, electrical and cooling work finance or rent the equipment.
• The growth is concentrated: Associated Builders and Contractors said July 2026's gain in nonresidential spending "was entirely due to data centers."
• Public records name the subs: FAA crane filings often list the crane, rigging or precast firm. City trade permits list the electrical and mechanical contractors. Stormwater permits usually list the general contractor, who can tell you who holds each trade package.
• Listed contractors confirm it: EMCOR's remaining performance obligations reached a record $17.14 billion at the end of the second quarter of 2026, up 43.9%. Sterling Infrastructure said in August 2026 that mission-critical projects make up 92% of its E-Infrastructure backlog.
• The risk is concentration and delay: Data Center Watch counted about $130 billion of projects blocked or delayed by local opposition in the first quarter of 2026 and about $68 billion in the second.

Who are the subcontractors on a data center project?

A data center build usually has one general contractor and a long list of trade subcontractors: site work and excavation, foundations and concrete, precast erection, crane and rigging, electrical, mechanical and cooling, fire protection, and low-voltage and fiber. Each trade brings its own crews and its own equipment, and each shows up in a different public record.

The trades don't overlap much. On EMCOR's second-quarter 2026 call, CEO Tony Guzzi put it plainly: "[T]he site contractors are not the electrical contractor of choice because they did the site work. These trades are very distinct..."

Big campuses spread the work wide. Meta said in December 2025 that more than 160 Louisiana businesses were supporting construction of its Richland Parish data center with electric, paving, utility work and more.

Trade	Typical equipment	Public record that names them
Site work and excavation	Excavators, dozers, articulated trucks, compactors	State stormwater permits (often filed by the general contractor)
Foundations, concrete and precast	Drill rigs, concrete pumps, crawler cranes	FAA crane filings
Crane and rigging	Mobile and crawler cranes, heavy-haul trailers	FAA crane filings
Electrical	Aerial lifts, cable pullers, trenchers, service trucks	City trade permits, union job calls
Mechanical and cooling	Telehandlers, lifts, pipe fabrication and welding equipment	City trade permits
Fire protection	Lifts, pipe threading and fabrication equipment, service trucks	City trade permits (fire sprinkler)
Low-voltage and fiber	Trenchers, directional drills, cable trailers	City trade permits, right-of-way permits

Why is the subcontractor the borrower, not the hyperscaler?

The owner's money pays for the building. The machines that build it belong to the contractors, and the contractors doing data center work are adding capacity fast.

An Associated Builders and Contractors survey released September 15, 2026 found that roughly 1 in 6 members is under contract on a data center, the highest share on record. Contractors with data center work reported 9.9 months of backlog, against 8.3 months for those without. In the AGC and NCCER workforce survey released September 3, 28% of contractors said they had done data center work in the past 12 months.

A lot of that capacity starts as a rental. Deere CFO Brent Norwood said on the company's fiscal third-quarter 2026 call that 30% to 35% of earthmoving transactions "start as a rental." Caterpillar said North American construction sales to users were driven by "very strong rental fleet loading." For a lender, that means the demand often appears at rental houses first, then turns into a purchase or a buyout.

The hyperscalers and the largest general contractors are rarely the deal. The mid-sized subcontractor with a growing backlog, more crews than last year, and a fleet stretched across three jobs usually is.

How much is being spent on data center construction in 2026?

Data center construction ran at a $75.2 billion seasonally adjusted annual rate in July 2026, up from $47.8 billion a year earlier, according to the Census Bureau. That's 10% of private nonresidential construction, up from about 6% a year ago. For full years, Census puts data center spending at $34.8 billion in 2024 and $49.7 billion in 2025.

Construction starts are running even hotter. ConstructConnect counted $84.1 billion of data center starts across 136 projects from January through July 2026, nearly three times the year-earlier level. Starts measure projects breaking ground, while Census measures spending put in place each month, so the two numbers aren't directly comparable.

The rest of the private market is softer. Excluding data centers, private nonresidential construction fell 7.3% year over year in July. ABC chief economist Anirban Basu said that excluding data centers, nonresidential spending "fell for the second straight month and is down to the lowest level since September 2023." The Associated General Contractors of America said only three categories are propping up construction spending: data centers, power, and highway projects.

Equipment makers see the same thing. Caterpillar's North American construction equipment sales rose 50% in the second quarter of 2026, and its power generation sales rose 29%, "primarily in data center applications." Deere named data center construction among the drivers of customer backlogs that "now extend well into fiscal year 27."

For the monthly numbers behind this, see our equipment finance market data tracker.

Who are the top data center subcontractors?

The publicly traded subcontractors with the most visible data center exposure in 2026 are EMCOR, Comfort Systems USA, IES Holdings, Sterling Infrastructure, MYR Group, Limbach and Dycom. Most are too big for a typical lender's program, but their quarterly reports are the clearest public read on where data center work is flowing. Mid-sized regional firms do much of the same work.

Company and trade	Latest reported quarter (mid-2026)	What it tells you
EMCOR (electrical, mechanical)	Record remaining performance obligations of $17.14 billion, up 43.9%. Most electrical-segment growth came from data center projects in network and communications, where revenue rose 45%.	Electrical and mechanical trades are where data center money lands first.
Comfort Systems USA (mechanical, electrical)	Record backlog of $14.1 billion. On its July call, the company said technology work was 58% of revenue, up from 40% a year earlier.	Technology work, mostly data centers, is now the largest end market for a top mechanical and electrical contractor.
IES Holdings (electrical)	Communications revenue up 51%, with "strong demand in the data center market" as the main driver.	Data center electrical demand reaches beyond the top two or three national firms.
Sterling Infrastructure (site work, electrical)	E-Infrastructure revenue up 192%, or 111% for its legacy site development business. Mission-critical projects, including data centers, are 92% of that segment's backlog.	Site development for data centers is its own growth business.
MYR Group (electrical)	Commercial and industrial revenue of $557.7 million, up 42%. On its call, the company cited data center awards in New Jersey, Arizona and Colorado.	Data center electrical awards are spread across several states.
Limbach (mechanical)	Gross margin hit by "competition for skilled labor and materials associated with construction activity in data center markets."	Data centers are pulling labor and materials away from other jobs.
Dycom (fiber)	Backlog of $12.24 billion, up 53.2%, partly from acquisitions. Revenue growth came in part from long-haul and middle-mile fiber builds.	Fiber contractors are a second-order data center play.

Who are the largest data center electrical subcontractors?

Electrical contractors see data center demand first because power is the biggest cost in the building. Cushman & Wakefield puts power infrastructure at about 21% of greenfield data center development cost. In EC&M's 2026 Top 50 Electrical Contractors report, published September 15, 2026, data centers were among the three hottest 2025 markets for 91% of responding firms, and the group's combined 2025 revenue rose 35% to $80.4 billion.

Publicly traded EMCOR, IES Holdings and MYR Group all reported strong data center electrical demand in mid-2026. Among private firms, Rosendin says its data center projects have deployed more than 15 GW of power, and Cache Valley Electric says it has built more than 1,100 MW of U.S. data center space. Below them sit hundreds of regional electrical contractors, like the Chicago and Austin firms in the permit table below, that fit most lenders' programs.

Which data center subcontractors are showing up in public records?

The two tables below list subcontractors that public records placed on U.S. data center projects in 2026. We pulled them from the FAA's obstruction evaluation filings and the open building-permit data published by Chicago and Austin, and re-checked each record on September 28, 2026. This isn't a list of companies seeking financing. It shows what the signal looks like and who is doing the work.

Data center subcontractors in FAA crane filings (2026)

Firm and trade	FAA case	Project and location	Determined
Haynes Mechanical Systems, mechanical (Greenwood Village, CO)	2026-ANM-4526-OE, 165-ft crane	Equinix data center, Douglas County, CO (near Centennial Airport)	Aug 10, 2026
A&A Transfer, rigging (Chantilly, VA)	2026-ACE-3186-OE, 135-ft crane	QTS CDR Building 7, Cedar Rapids, IA	Sep 15, 2026
La Grange Crane Service, crane (Hodgkins, IL)	2026-AGL-13119-OE, 98-ft crane	CHI12 data center, Elk Grove Village, IL	Aug 18, 2026
Metromont, precast (Greenville, SC)	2026-AEA-2426-OE, 240-ft crane	Stack SDC campus, Stafford County, VA (near Fredericksburg)	May 12, 2026
Precast Services, precast erection (Twinsburg, OH)	2026-AEA-1353-OE, 215-ft crane	NYSE data center, Mahwah, NJ	May 5, 2026
Vic's Crane & Heavy Haul, crane (Rosemount, MN)	2025-AGL-14944-OE, 370-ft crane	Harwood data center, near Fargo, ND	Jan 13, 2026

Data center subcontractors in Chicago and Austin trade permits (2026)

Firm and trade	Permit	Project and location	Issued
Kelso-Burnett, electrical (Rolling Meadows, IL)	Chicago 101084518	400 S. LaSalle St., office-to-data-center conversion	Sep 16, 2026
Bonus Electric, electrical (Romeoville, IL)	Chicago 101084518	400 S. LaSalle St., Chicago	Sep 16, 2026
Hill Mechanical, mechanical (Franklin Park, IL)	Chicago 101081831	350 E. Cermak Rd., data center remodel	Aug 5, 2026
Continental Electrical Construction, electrical (Oak Brook, IL)	Chicago 101081831	350 E. Cermak Rd., Chicago	Aug 5, 2026
Helm Mechanical, plumbing (Freeport, IL)	Chicago 101074646	2538 S. Wabash Ave., new data center addition	Feb 13, 2026
Maron Electric, electrical (Skokie, IL)	Chicago 101074646	2538 S. Wabash Ave., Chicago	Feb 13, 2026
Prism Electric, electrical (Garland, TX)	Austin 2025-155325 EP	7000 Burleson Rd., data center expansion	Mar 19, 2026
Airco Mechanical, mechanical (Round Rock, TX)	Austin 2025-155325 MP	7000 Burleson Rd., Austin	Jan 12, 2026
Exceed Electrical Contracting, electrical (Westminster, CO)	Austin 2026-036762 EP	Modular data center pad, 811 Clayton Ln., Austin	May 20, 2026

A few patterns stand out:

• The owners are well known, the subs mostly aren't: Equinix, QTS, Stack and Digital Realty are household names in the industry. The firms lifting, wiring and cooling their buildings are regional contractors most lenders have never called.
• Crane filings reach beyond cranes: a mechanical contractor filed the Colorado crane, and precast firms filed two of the others. The filer is often the trade that owns the lift.
• Ownership varies: A&A Transfer is part of MEI Industrial Solutions, Metromont is majority-owned by Markel Group, and Prism Electric was acquired by Loenbro in September 2026. Parent and sponsor ownership changes who signs and who guarantees.

How do you find data center subcontractors in public records?

Three public records name data center subcontractors directly: FAA crane filings, city trade permits, and state stormwater permits. Other records find the project earlier but only name the owner, so treat them as a watch list and check back as the job moves.

Record	What it names	When it appears	Coverage
FAA crane filings (Form 7460-1)	The filer: often the crane, rigging, precast or mechanical sub	At least 45 days before the crane goes up	National, but only tall cranes or cranes near airports
City trade permits	The electrical, mechanical and plumbing contractors	At mobilization	Cities with open data; weak in unincorporated counties
Stormwater construction permits	The site operator, usually the general contractor, with a contact	Before grading (EPA requires 14 days)	EPA covers a few states directly; most states run their own
Union job calls	The electrical contractor and project code	Mid-build, as crews ramp	Union markets
Air permits, zoning, state project registrations	The owner or developer	Months ahead	Varies by state

Working the FAA filings: the FAA's obstruction evaluation system publishes every filing. Pull the last two weeks, keep the crane filings, and look for data center names or the codes owners use (campus names, airport codes, "DC" numbers). The city on a filing is the nearest airport's city, so map the coordinates. Set aside owners and the big general contractors. The crane, rigging, precast and mechanical firms left over are your calls.

Working city permit data: Chicago and Austin both publish building permits with contractor names in open data. Filter the descriptions for "data center," keep electrical, mechanical and grading permits from the last 90 days, and export the contractor names. Where a county has no open data, look up known campus addresses one at a time.

Working stormwater permits: EPA's permit search covers the areas where EPA runs the program. Virginia, Ohio and Texas publish their own. Look at acres disturbed and planned start date. A large acreage means heavy site work, and a record that switches its operator from "to be determined" to a named firm usually means the general contractor was just picked. Call the general contractor's project team and ask who has the site work, concrete and electrical packages.

Most of the other signals, like state incentive awards and early permits, work the same way on data centers as on factories. Our plant expansion guide covers them, and the DOT contract awards guide covers how to tell a prime contractor from a sub on public jobs.

What should you ask a data center subcontractor?

The first call should find out how much of the firm's growth rides on one project, and how long that project lasts. These questions usually open the conversation:

• How much of your backlog is data center work: a firm with 70% of its backlog on one campus is a different credit from one spread across 10 jobs.
• Who is your customer on the job: subs usually contract with the general contractor, not the owner. Payment terms and retainage follow that contract.
• Is the equipment tied to one project: a data center build can run two or three years. Ask what happens to the fleet after the job ends.
• Are you renting now and planning to buy: a sub renting heavily to cover a new job is often weighing a purchase or a rental buyout.
• Who owns the company: private equity ownership, a parent company, or an employee stock plan all change the guarantee and the approval path.

For turning those answers into a routing decision, see the credit box template.

What could slow data center construction down?

Data center construction is growing fast, but not every announced project gets built on time. Data Center Watch counted about $130 billion of projects blocked or delayed by local opposition in the first quarter of 2026 and about $68 billion in the second.

Some of that is already showing up in the field. On its September 2026 call, Sunbelt Rentals said data centers are "only 13%" of its mega-project universe, and noted "some of that moratorium realities coming into effect in certain localities." Dodge Construction Network said "weaker data center planning" drove a flatter Dodge Momentum Index in August 2026.

None of that removes the opportunity. It means a subcontractor's pipeline is only as good as the specific campuses in it, so ask which ones and check their status.

Where Quintel fits

Quintel reads public records for signs that a company's next equipment deal is forming, resolves each record to the operating company, and ranks the results against what your desk funds. Data center and construction activity are part of what it covers. You can do the work above by hand. Quintel does it every day, across more records than a rep can check.

Frequently asked questions

What does a data center subcontractor do?

A data center subcontractor performs one trade package on the project, such as site work, foundations, precast erection, crane and rigging, electrical, mechanical and cooling, fire protection, or fiber. The general contractor hires and coordinates them. Each trade brings its own crews and equipment, and each tends to show up in a different public record.

Who are the largest data center subcontractors?

Among publicly traded firms, EMCOR, Comfort Systems USA, IES Holdings, MYR Group and Sterling Infrastructure all report large data center exposure in 2026. EMCOR's remaining performance obligations reached $17.14 billion in the second quarter, and Comfort Systems reported a $14.1 billion backlog. Many regional private firms do the same work at smaller scale.

Who are the largest data center electrical contractors?

The largest include Rosendin, which says its data center projects have deployed more than 15 GW of power, and publicly traded EMCOR, IES Holdings and MYR Group, which all reported strong data center electrical demand in mid-2026. In EC&M's 2026 Top 50 Electrical Contractors report, 91% of responding firms ranked data centers among their three hottest markets.

How much does it cost to build a data center per megawatt?

Cushman & Wakefield's 2026 Data Center Development Cost Guide, released September 3, 2026, puts the average all-in greenfield cost at $17.6 million per megawatt for U.S. and Canadian facilities, excluding chips and GPUs. That's up 21% since the fourth quarter of 2024. Power infrastructure is about 21% of the total.

How do I find subcontractors working on a data center project?

Start with FAA crane filings, which often name the crane, rigging or precast firm, and city trade permits, which name the electrical and mechanical contractors. State stormwater permits name the site operator, usually the general contractor, who can tell you who holds each trade package.

Do data center subcontractors finance or rent equipment?

Both. Deere says 30% to 35% of earthmoving transactions start as a rental, and Caterpillar cited very strong rental fleet loading in 2026. Subcontractors often rent to cover a new job, then buy or finance once the backlog looks durable. Because a data center build can run two or three years, ask what the fleet does after the job ends.

Is data center construction still growing in 2026?

Yes. Census data shows data center construction at a $75.2 billion annual rate in July 2026, up 57.2% from a year earlier. Planning has cooled somewhat: Dodge Construction Network said weaker data center planning flattened its momentum index in August 2026, and some localities have paused new projects.

Are FAA crane filings public?

Yes. The FAA's obstruction evaluation system at oeaaa.faa.gov publishes filings for cranes and structures that need airspace review, including the filer's name, height, location and determination date. Only cranes above set heights or near airports have to file, so rural sites with short cranes may not appear.

Primary sources

This article is for general information and is not legal, credit or investment advice. Companies named in the public-record tables appear because public filings place them on data center projects. They are not Quintel customers, and their listing says nothing about their financial condition or financing needs.

• U.S. Census Bureau, Construction Spending, July 2026 release and private construction detail tables, September 1, 2026: monthly table and annual table
• Associated Builders and Contractors, July nonresidential construction spending release, September 1, 2026: abc.org
• Associated Builders and Contractors, Construction Backlog Indicator, September 15, 2026: globenewswire.com
• Associated General Contractors of America, construction spending release, September 1, 2026: agc.org
• AGC and NCCER, 2026 workforce survey, September 3, 2026: agc.org
• ConstructConnect, September 2026 Data Center Report, August 28, 2026: constructconnect.com
• Caterpillar, second-quarter 2026 results, August 4, 2026, and earnings call: prnewswire.com and fool.com
• Deere & Company, fiscal third-quarter 2026 earnings call, August 20, 2026: fool.com
• EMCOR Group, second-quarter 2026 results and earnings call, July 30, 2026: nasdaq.com and fool.com
• Comfort Systems USA, second-quarter 2026 results and earnings call, July 23, 2026: comfortsystemsusa.com and investing.com
• IES Holdings, fiscal third-quarter 2026 results, July 31, 2026: sec.gov
• Sterling Infrastructure, second-quarter 2026 results, August 3, 2026: prnewswire.com
• MYR Group, second-quarter 2026 results, July 29, 2026, and earnings call: sec.gov and fool.com
• Limbach Holdings, second-quarter 2026 results, August 4, 2026: nasdaq.com
• Dycom Industries, fiscal second-quarter 2027 results, August 26, 2026: sec.gov
• EC&M, 2026 Top 50 Electrical Contractors special report, September 15, 2026: ecmweb.com
• Rosendin, data centers: rosendin.com
• Cache Valley Electric, mission critical: cve.com
• Meta, Richland Parish data center economic impact, December 19, 2025: about.fb.com
• Cushman & Wakefield, 2026 Data Center Development Cost Guide, September 3, 2026: nasdaq.com
• Data Center Watch, Q1 and Q2 2026 reports: datacenterwatch.org/q1-2026 and datacenterwatch.org/q2-2026
• Sunbelt Rentals, fiscal first-quarter 2027 earnings call, September 9, 2026: fool.com
• Dodge Construction Network, Dodge Momentum Index, September 8, 2026: construction.com
• MEI Rigging & Crating acquisition of A&A Transfer: prnewswire.com
• Markel investment in Metromont: markel.com
• Loenbro acquisition of Prism Electric, September 2026: peprofessional.com
• Federal Aviation Administration, Obstruction Evaluation / Airport Airspace Analysis: oeaaa.faa.gov
• U.S. EPA, NPDES permit search: permitsearch.epa.gov
• City of Chicago, Building Permits open data: data.cityofchicago.org
• City of Austin, Issued Construction Permits open data: data.austintexas.gov