Data Center Business Development Manager

There’s a Place for You at Capital

A career at Capital Electric is more than a job. You’re investing in a brighter, more sustainable future together and joining a team that makes a real difference for our customers. Capital Electric offers electrical products and services to contractors. If it helps bring electricity to an office, home, factory or other building – you can find it here. We operate in Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, and are part of the Sonepar group, the world’s #1 electrical distributor with over 45,000 associates around the globe.

Being “Powered by Difference” means we respect and value diverse perspectives. Within Capital Electric, we offer a supportive culture and great benefits, and as part of the larger Sonepar group, we can offer exciting opportunities to grow your career.

We are seeking a proactive and strategic Business Development Manager – Data Center to own the data center vertical within Capital Electric assigned geographic territory. This is a hunter-style role focused on early-stage project intelligence, relationship mapping, and positioning Sonepar/ Capital Electric as the preferred electrical distribution partner with data center owners, developers, operators, and their design/build teams.

This is not a traditional outside sales role. You will act as the market expert for data center construction and expansion, identifying projects 12–36 months before bid, building multi-level relationships, and driving specification and preferred-vendor status at the end-user level while coordinating execution through our local branches.

• Proactively identify, track, and map every data center project (hyperscale, colocation, enterprise, edge) in your assigned territory using proprietary tools, Dodge/DataCenter, IIR, Dynamics/BAE reports, public filings, permitting data, and direct outreach.
• Collaboration with executive and regional leadership to identify opportunities, provide insight and guidance on sales/service requirements, engage local branch teams when directed or necessary to drive market share and sales growth.
• Build and maintain an accurate, real-time project pipeline database including owner/developer, GC, MEP contractor, engineer, timeline, size (MW), and current supplier incumbents.
• Develop deep relationships with data center end-users (Ex. Meta, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Equinix, Digital Realty, QTS, CyrusOne, Vantage, Aligned, etc.), their procurement teams, mission-critical engineering firms (Corgan, HDR, Syska Hennessy, etc.), and key influencers.
• Position Sonepar/Capital Electric early in the design/specification phase through lunch & learns, spec-in support, value-engineering collaboration, and preferred distributor agreements.
• Serve as the central point of contact between the end-user/owner and our regional and local branch network; ensure seamless hand-off and execution once projects move to procurement.
• Effectively collaborate with Capital Electric executive and regional leadership and with Richard Landry & the Sonepar DataCenter Business Development Team.
• Conduct regular project reviews and strategy sessions with regional leadership
• Attend key industry events (Data Center World, 7x24 Exchange, PTC, DCD Connect, etc.) to expand network and gather intelligence.
• Achieve quarterly and annual revenue, project capture, and pipeline development targets.

Minimum work experience requirements:

• 5–7+ years of B2B sales or business development experience in electrical distribution, mission-critical power, data centers, or related construction verticals.
• Proven track record of hunting new business and building relationships at the C-suite and procurement level with hyperscale/colocation owners strongly preferred.
• Existing network within the data center ecosystem (owners, developers, engineers, GCs) in the target geography is a significant advantage.
• Strong understanding of data center power infrastructure (MV switchgear, transformers, PDU/RPP, UPS, generators, busway, etc.) and the design/build process.
• Experience using project intelligence platforms (Dodge, ConstructConnect, Industrial Info Resource, DataCenterKnowledge, etc.) and CRM (SPARK).
• Exceptional organizational skills and attention to detail — you will own the single source of truth for data center activity in your territory.
• Self-starter comfortable working remotely with regular