Construction demand for artificial intelligence-related facilities this year still has a considerable runway, executives said during Jacobs’ fiscal first-quarter earnings call on Tuesday.
Pipeline growth hit double-digit rates year over year across the firm’s major verticals, with life sciences and advanced manufacturing up about 25% and critical infrastructure work up more than 50%, said CEO Bob Pragada during the call. That growth represents a 12- to 18-month work pipeline across all markets, including the Middle East and Europe.
Much of that jump ties back to AI-driven projects.
“If you think about the speed right now that we are going at, especially not just in the private sector, but also in the water market and transportation, the schedules and the delivery model for these can’t be done without the use of the AI platform,” said Pragada during the call. “It is driving backlog growth through differentiation in our award rates.”
To support that, the Dallas-based contractor has doubled the size of its AI efforts on the development and consultancy side, including implementing tools to automate tasks and improve predictive analytics onsite.
“In the field, we’re using some strong predictive analytics platform called Acuity in order to really get out in front of field level issues that are coming up in real time,” said Pragada. “That’s been a real game changer for us. We’ve got Acuity deployed across all of our end markets in the field program management work that we do.”
Key work still revolves around data center and semiconductor projects, according to Jacobs.
On those projects, Pragada said owners often purchase large electrical equipment directly, but still contract Jacobs with integrating them into the facility. For that reason, more wins now stretch into balance of plant construction and utility interconnections, in addition to design work. That allows Jacobs to earn fees even when major components are passed through.
Beyond advanced facilities, Jacobs also reported strong demand in the water sector, both in the U.S. and internationally, in the quarter. Bookings in water-related construction have posted gains over several quarters, said Venk Nathamuni, chief financial officer at Jacobs.
Q1 numbers
Jacobs reported $125.51 million in profit for its fiscal first quarter 2026 compared to a $18.13 million loss during the same period last year. Revenue for the quarter hit $3.29 billion, about a 12.3% gain from $2.93 billion a year ago.
Backlog jumped to $26.3 billion for the full fiscal year 2025, about a 20.6% gain from $21.82 billion in fiscal year 2024, according to the earnings report.
“Larger scope awards for data centers, life sciences and advanced manufacturing were the clear drivers,” wrote Andrew Wittmann, senior research analyst with Baird, in a research note. “Net, seemingly good demand is holding up, execution is as expected.”
