Builders tout more than just data centers in latest earnings reports
Balfour Beatty CEO Philip Hoare stated during the H1 2026 earnings call that data centers have become the hottest topic in the industry. Large publicly traded construction firms, while enjoying the concentrated boom brought by data center construction, also emphasized maintaining business diversification, covering transportation, aviation, energy, and infrastructure megaprojects. Data shows that companies with annual revenues exceeding $100 million had a backlog of 12.1 months in July, while smaller contractors had only 7 months.
Balfour Beatty CEO Philip Hoare summed up construction’s news of the moment succinctly.
“You can’t pick up anything these days and not read about data centers,” Hoare said during the firm’s first-half 2026 earnings call Wednesday.
Indeed, on the latest round of earnings calls from public builders, data center builds were the main topic of conversation. That makes sense, since data center construction has so dominated the sector that it is masking a broader weakness among contractors, especially smaller ones.
It makes sense then that large builders are enjoying most of this highly concentrated boom; firms with more than $100 million in annual revenue, for example, reported 12.1 months of backlog in July, compared to seven months for contractors with less than $30 million in revenue.
That includes public contractors. But these builders also seem to be keeping the cardinal rule of business in mind: stay diversified.
In addition to data centers, publicly-traded firms emphasized they are maintaining a focus on other sectors, too, including transportation, aviation, energy and infrastructure megaprojects.
Read below for insights from public contractors’ latest earnings reports.