Data centers
We do takeoffs and priced estimates for data center shells, data halls, power, and cooling, split by building and phase. GCs, MEP subs, developers, and suppliers across the US send us their drawings.
Project types we estimate
What you get on every job
Nationwide coverage
Client feedback
Reviews from contractors and subcontractors who send us their bid estimates, takeoffs, and shop drawings.
Review summary: Bart needed shop drawings on a tight schedule. The team discussed the project the same day, delivered drawings within a week, and completed minor revisions the following day. He praised their understanding of the scope, quick responses and progress updates.
Bart, BTW Enterprises, INC.
Read reviewReview summary: Ludin appreciated the professional team, their patience and guidance, and recommended BidAccurate for takeoff and shop drawing projects.
Ludin Pierre
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Data center estimating support
BidAccurate provides data center construction estimating services for projects across the US. We work from your civil, architectural, structural, electrical, and mechanical drawings and the specs. You get quantity takeoffs and priced estimates for the whole building, or just for the trades you bid.
A data center is mostly power and cooling wrapped in a building. The electrical and mechanical scope tends to outweigh everything else, the owner often buys the biggest equipment, and the job may be released one data hall at a time. We set up the estimate so each of those splits stays visible.
What makes data centers different
The building itself is fairly simple. The money is in the power path, the cooling plant, the redundancy, and the question of who buys which piece of equipment.
Many data centers go out as a powered shell first, with data halls fitted out in later phases as tenants sign. One drawing set can hold three or four different scopes, and the bid form rarely splits them the way the drawings do.
How we handle it
We break the estimate out by building, phase, and data hall. Shell, core, and each fit-out phase get their own totals, so you can price today's scope and hold the rest as alternates.
Electrical is usually the biggest scope on the job. Medium-voltage switchgear, transformers, UPS systems, generators, paralleling gear, PDUs, and overhead busway all stack up, and feeder runs between rooms are long and heavy.
How we handle it
We count gear by lineup and room, and measure feeders, conduit, and cable tray in LF by path. Duct banks and yard work are taken off separately from the gear inside the building.
N+1, 2N, and distributed redundant designs repeat equipment and pathways across A and B sides. It's tempting to count one side and double it. The two paths rarely run the same length, though, and sometimes they don't use the same gear.
How we handle it
We take off each path from the one-lines and plans as drawn. When the A and B sides differ, the estimate shows both instead of an average.
Air-cooled halls with CRAH units and hot-aisle containment look nothing like halls built for direct-to-chip liquid cooling with CDUs and secondary piping. Some projects show both. Others leave the liquid loop as a future phase and say so in one note on one sheet.
How we handle it
We measure chillers, cooling towers or dry coolers, air handlers, piping by size in LF, and containment from the mechanical drawings. Future or optional cooling scope goes on its own line.
Owners often buy generators, switchgear, UPS modules, and chillers directly because of lead times. Someone on the contractor side still has to set it, connect it, and start it up. That split is easy to misread.
How we handle it
We list every major piece of equipment as OFCI or CFCI based on the documents. Install, rigging, and connection labor stay in your number even when the material doesn't.
Large slab-on-grade footprints, generator and transformer pads, equipment yards, tilt-up or precast walls, and roof screens for rooftop gear add up fast. Utility duct banks and storm systems can run across the whole campus.
How we handle it
We take off concrete in CY and rebar by weight, and keep yard, pad, and site utility quantities apart from the building itself.
A hyperscale campus and an edge site are both data centers. Past that, the scope, phasing, and who's paying have little in common.
Large single-tenant buildings on a multi-building campus, usually built in phases with shared substations and site utilities.
Multi-tenant buildings where data halls, cages, and suites get fitted out as space leases. The base building has to carry the power and cooling for future tenants.
The building, utility service, and core infrastructure, delivered ready for a tenant or owner to fit out the white space later.
Fitting out a new hall inside an existing building, or adding capacity to a live facility where shutdowns and tie-ins have to be planned.
Owner-operated facilities for one company, a hospital system, a university, or a government agency, often inside or next to an existing campus.
Smaller facilities near users, or prefabricated power and IT modules set on a prepared site. Most of the field work is foundations, utilities, and hookups.
Send the drawings, specs, equipment schedules, and your bid date. We'll review the set and come back with the scope, phases, and a delivery date.
Request Your Data Center EstimateAsk for the whole building or only your trades. Quantities come broken out by building, phase, and data hall either way.
Budget, bid, build, and the next hall
The budget moves when the power design firms up, when the owner buys gear, and when the next hall gets released. We revise the estimate each time and note what changed.
Stage 1 · Feasibility
An early number built from the site, building size, critical IT load, and redundancy level. We list every assumption so you can see what the budget includes.
Stage 2 · Design
As the one-lines, mechanical plans, and structure develop, we update the quantities and show which scopes moved.
Stage 3 · Bidding
Full takeoffs and priced estimates from the CDs, split by building, phase, and bid package.
Stage 4 · Value engineering
Side-by-side pricing for options like cooling approach, wall system, or distribution layout when you or the design team bring them up.
Stage 5 · Construction
Revised quantities for addenda and change orders, and updated estimates when the next data hall is released.
An electrical sub wants gear counts and feeder LF. A developer wants a budget to hold up against the GC's number. Tell us which one you are and we'll lay out the estimate that way.
General contractors
A trade-by-trade number for shell, core, and each data hall, so you can level sub bids and price phases separately.
Electrical and mechanical subs
Gear counts, feeder and conduit LF, piping by size, and equipment lists that match how you price and buy.
Developers and owners
An estimate to check against the GC's number, with cost per SF and, if you give us the IT load, cost per MW.
Suppliers
Counts and lengths for cable tray, conduit, wire, piping, and panels that you can quote from.
In-house estimators
Extra takeoff hours when a data center bid lands on top of everything else. We deliver in a format your team can check.
Shell, core, and each hall carry their own totals. Pricing a later phase doesn't mean starting the estimate over.
Owner-furnished and contractor-furnished gear are marked line by line, so material and install labor don't get mixed up.
Every feeder, tray run, and pipe size ties back to a color-coded markup on the plans.
We report totals by trade and phase, per SF, and per MW of IT load when you give us the design capacity.
The same team also handles takeoffs, BIM, shop drawings, drafting, and permit sets for data center work.
Material, labor, and equipment pricing for a full data center project.
Quantities by trade, building, and data hall for your bid.
3D models for coordinating busway, cable tray, piping, and structure overhead in data halls.
Rebar, steel, and equipment support shop drawings for data center work.
Drawing sets for permit submittal on new buildings, expansions, and fit-outs.
Plans, elevations, and CDs drafted to your office standards.
Estimating for other building types we work on.
Partner with experienced construction professionals to deliver your project on time along with in budget.
