AI ignites demand for tradespeople powering data center build-out

Demand for new AI data centers is surging, but they can’t build themselves.

Big Tech is funneling billions into building out these specialized facilities, with the four hyperscalers, Alphabet, Microsoft, Meta, and Amazon, committing nearly $700 billion in combined capex spending this year to fund these developments.

Amazon said last month that it’s committing $12 billion to build a new AI data center in Louisiana, which will create 540 full-time jobs on site as well as 1,700 other roles for electricians, technicians, and security specialists.

Meta also invested $27 billion last year in a joint venture with Blue Owl Capital to construct its mammoth Hyperion data center in Louisiana, which is expected to consume more electricity than the city of New Orleans.  

While anxiety around AI replacing white-collar jobs has reached a fever pitch, the data center boom is creating lucrative opportunities for skilled trade workers.

“The digital revolution requires a massive physical foundation,” Sander van’t Noordende, CEO of the world’s largest recruitment firm Randstad, told CNBC. “Ultimately, the real constraint on global tech growth isn’t solely related to a shortage of microchips, energy, or capital; it is the severe scarcity of the specialized talent required to build it.”

Between 2022 and 2026, demand for robotic technicians increased by 107%, according to a global analysis of 50 million job postings released by Randstad on Wednesday. For cooling — or HVAC — system engineers, the growth rate was 67%, and vacancies for industrial automation technicians grew by 51%.

Meanwhile, job listings for traditional skilled trade jobs such as construction workers and electricians increased by 27%, according to Randstad’s analysis.

“The debate around AI’s impact on the labor market often focuses entirely on the software side, specifically, whether generative models will displace white-collar jobs. But a critical reality is being completely overlooked: AI cannot build its own data centers,” Noordende said via emailed comments.

With roughly 12,000 data centers existing globally today, and thousands more to be built to house high-performance AI computing capacity, it’s essential to update outdated mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems every four to six years, according to Mike Mathews, digital infrastructure leader at professional services firm Marsh.

Mathews noted “massive growth areas specific to labor” as a result of these retrofitting requirements, with network engineers, electricians, mechanical engineers, and plumbing and heating contractors deployed to install new liquid cooling systems.

A fourth-generation plumber himself, Mathews described these roles as “new-collar” jobs, which will see traditional white-collar and blue-collar employees working alongside each other and being valued the same.

“The data center space will be the first time when we’ve had highly compensated, high-skilled trades workers physically working next to network engineers who…