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Sterling Construction vs. Other Publicly Traded Infrastructure Contractors

Sterling Infrastructure spans transportation, building, and mission-critical site work. Here is how to compare it with adjacent public contractors without mistaking scale or backlog for a like-for-like match.
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Sterling Infrastructure, Inc. (NASDAQ: STRL)—the company meant by “Sterling Construction” here—does not have a single, perfectly matched public-company peer. Its businesses span data-center and industrial site development, transportation infrastructure, and residential concrete and building services. Quanta Services is a useful scale comparison, but its utility- and power-heavy business is much larger and not a like-for-like match. A useful comparison therefore starts with business mix, reporting changes, and backlog definitions rather than revenue alone.

What Sterling Infrastructure does

Sterling reports three operating segments, each serving different customers and project markets. That breadth is why the label “infrastructure contractor” can obscure important differences between Sterling and adjacent public companies.

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E-Infrastructure Solutions

This segment provides large-scale site development and mission-critical electrical services for data centers, semiconductor fabrication, manufacturing, distribution centers, warehousing, and power generation.

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Transportation Solutions

This segment works on highways, roads, bridges, airports, ports, rail, and storm drainage.

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Building Solutions

This segment provides residential and commercial concrete foundations and other concrete work, plumbing, and surveying for new single-family residential construction. Sterling operates primarily across the Southern, Northeastern, Mid-Atlantic, and Rocky Mountain regions and the Pacific Islands. Sterling’s 2025 Form 10-K says the company has traditionally pursued a mid-level market: projects too large for small local contractors but too small for the largest national and international firms. It also warns that a weaker market can draw both ends of that market toward Sterling’s work, increasing bidding pressure.

Which public companies are reasonable comparisons?

A comparison set is not a list of companies that compete with Sterling on every project. Geography, service category, and customer needs shape competition, and construction services are often local or regional. Comfort Systems USA’s 2025 annual report names Comfort Systems USA, EMCOR Group, IES Holdings, MasTec, MYR Group, Primoris Services, Quanta Services, and Sterling Infrastructure among large publicly traded U.S. construction-services companies. That list is useful for identifying adjacent firms, not establishing direct competition across all Sterling segments.

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Quanta Services: a scale comparison, not a twin

Quanta is the clearest scale contrast in the supplied figures. Its work spans utility, power generation, load center, communications, pipeline, and energy markets. Quanta estimated its 2025 revenue mix as 70% utility and power, 17% energy and other, and 13% technology, manufacturing, and communications. For fiscal 2025, ended December 31, it reported $28.5 billion in revenue, $1,028.4 million in net income, and $2,876 million in adjusted EBITDA on its investor-relations page. Its annual-results release gives consolidated revenue of $28.48 billion and total backlog of $43.98 billion at year-end. Quanta’s investor-relations page and 2025 results release report those company figures.

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Quanta’s larger scale and utility/power-heavy mix make it an adjacent infrastructure-services comparison rather than a direct proxy for Sterling’s three-segment portfolio. A company’s inclusion in an industry peer set does not mean its revenue, margins, or project economics are directly comparable.

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How to compare business mix and demand exposure

The first question is what each contractor builds and who pays for it. Sterling’s transportation work is tied to public and transportation infrastructure markets, while its E-Infrastructure segment serves private investment in data centers, manufacturing, semiconductors, and related facilities. Building Solutions adds residential and commercial construction exposure. Quanta’s reported revenue mix, by contrast, is predominantly utility and power, with additional energy, communications, technology, and manufacturing activity.

This distinction matters when assessing demand drivers. Public infrastructure spending, private data-center and manufacturing investment, and utility or power-system investment do not move in lockstep. A revenue comparison that ignores these exposures can make two contractors look more alike than they are.

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  • Service mix: compare the actual work performed, not just broad labels such as “infrastructure” or “construction services.”
  • Geography and customers: identify the regions served and the customer base behind the work. Local and regional competition can differ substantially.
  • Scale and project size: Sterling describes its traditional target as a middle market between small local contractors and the largest national and international firms; Quanta’s reported financial scale is much larger.
  • Profitability and acquisitions: assess operating results alongside revenue and identify changes in the consolidated business before comparing periods.
  • Contract visibility: distinguish signed backlog from awards, options, and future opportunities, and consider when that work is likely to convert to revenue.

Why Sterling’s 2025 revenue needs context

Sterling reported total revenue of $2.490 billion for 2025. That figure is not a clean basis for an unadjusted year-over-year comparison: the company deconsolidated Road and Highway Builders (RHB) beginning January 1, 2025, so RHB revenue is not included in Sterling’s 2025 consolidated revenue. RHB backlog was also excluded from Sterling’s consolidated backlog beginning December 31, 2024. Sterling acquired CEC Facilities Group on September 1, 2025, adding a specialty electrical and mechanical contractor to E-Infrastructure Solutions. These changes affect which businesses and months are represented in the reported results; comparisons should account for them rather than treating the revenue figure as if the company’s scope were unchanged. Sterling details the changes in its 2025 Form 10-K.

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Backlog is not the same as an opportunity pool

Backlog can help describe contracted or awarded work, but companies may define and present it differently. It is not automatically equivalent to future revenue: timing, project phases, customer decisions, and execution affect conversion. Compare each company’s definition, composition, consolidation scope, and reporting date before using backlog as a measure of visibility.

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In its second-quarter 2026 release, Sterling said mission-critical projects—including data centers, manufacturing, and semiconductor facilities—accounted for 92% of E-Infrastructure backlog at quarter-end. The same release described a more-than-$7.0 billion pool combining signed backlog, unsigned awards, and future-phase opportunities. That combined opportunity pool is broader than signed backlog and should not be presented as if all of it were contracted work. Sterling’s second-quarter 2026 results release also raised full-year guidance to revenue of $4.00–$4.15 billion and adjusted EBITDA of $891–$916 million. Those figures are management guidance, not realized results.

Quanta reported $43.98 billion of total backlog at December 31, 2025. It is not directly comparable to Sterling’s more-than-$7.0 billion combined opportunity pool: the figures cover different dates and different stated categories. Even headline backlog figures require caution unless the companies’ definitions, composition, reporting periods, and consolidation scopes align.

What company commentary does—and does not—tell you

In Quanta’s February 19, 2026 results release, President and Chief Executive Officer Duke Austin said: “Quanta closed 2025 with another strong quarter, delivering double-digit year-over-year growth in revenue and adjusted EBITDA, while achieving record fourth-quarter and full-year results across multiple key financial metrics. Backlog was exceptionally strong at a record $44.0 billion, reflecting accelerating demand in our Electric segment and sustained activity across our end markets, which positions us well heading into 2026.” This is company commentary accompanying reported results, not an independent assessment of future performance. Quanta’s release also reports its year-end backlog as $43.98 billion.

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A practical comparison framework

When comparing Sterling with publicly traded infrastructure contractors, use the following sequence rather than ranking the companies by a single headline number:

  1. Map the segments: identify whether the work is transportation, utility and power, mission-critical site development, specialty building services, or another category.
  2. Match the markets: separate public infrastructure spending from private data-center, manufacturing, residential, and utility investment.
  3. Check geographic and customer overlap: the same firms may be competitors in one region or service line and not in another.
  4. Normalize the periods and business scope: account for acquisitions, deconsolidations, and other changes before comparing revenue or profitability.
  5. Read backlog definitions closely: separate signed work from unsigned awards and future-phase opportunities; compare figures only when reporting dates and definitions are sufficiently aligned.
  6. Consider project scale: revenue size alone does not show whether companies pursue similar contracts or face the same bidding dynamics.

On this basis, Sterling is best understood as a diversified contractor with distinct transportation, building, and fast-growing mission-critical infrastructure exposures. Quanta offers a useful larger-scale reference point, but its mix and scale make it an adjacent comparison, not a like-for-like substitute.

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