Meade Engineering announced on 27 October that Amit Sahdev, PE, has joined as chief operating officer. He started on 19 October and will move from Houston to Arizona. At first he will oversee the firm's engineering organisation, and the company expects his remit to grow over time.
Who is Meade Engineering
Meade is based in Tempe, Arizona, and has been operating for 36 years. It offers mechanical, electrical, plumbing, fire protection and power engineering, plus commissioning and technical analysis, across mission-critical, healthcare, commercial and industrial markets. The firm says it has worked on more than 12,000 projects.
Who is Amit Sahdev
Sahdev joins from Shermco Industries, the Blackstone-owned electrical testing and services company, where he ran a P&L of more than $100m and led 230 engineers across 14 offices in the US and Canada. Before that he was a partner at LJA Engineering, helping to lead its automation and electrical division and sitting on its AI tools and standards committee. His sector experience covers data centres, semiconductors, renewable energy and utilities. He holds a master's in electrical engineering from California State University, Long Beach and an MBA from Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management.
CEO John Meade said the firm took its time over the hire: "We were deliberate about finding the right leader for Engineering." Sahdev pointed to the firm's culture, saying: "There's a strong foundation here, and I'm excited to help build on it".
Why it matters
Mission-critical clients want design partners who can scale quickly without losing quality, and that puts pressure on engineering leadership. Hiring an operator with experience running a multi-office engineering business, rather than promoting a senior designer, suggests Meade is planning for growth across several markets at once.
His first brief is the engineering organisation itself. At a firm offering mechanical, electrical, plumbing, fire protection and power design alongside commissioning, that means getting several disciplines to work as one team on complex, fast-moving projects.
The move also shows how electrical power expertise is shaping MEP leadership. Sahdev's background is in power systems, testing and automation, the disciplines that sit at the centre of mission-critical design. As data centre loads rise, MEP firms that can engineer power distribution as well as cooling are better placed to win the work.
What it means for hiring
- We are seeing MEP design firms look outside their own ranks for operating leaders, especially people who have run large, multi-office engineering teams with full P&L responsibility.
- In our view, electrical and power engineering backgrounds are becoming a stronger route to the top of MEP firms, reflecting how central power is to mission-critical projects.
- Senior engineers who also understand automation and AI tooling look set to be in demand as firms try to grow output without growing headcount at the same rate.
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Sources
- Meade Engineering Names Amit Sahdev, PE, Chief Operating Officer · Meade Engineering via PR Newswire · 27 Oct 2026
Written by QP Group from the reporting and announcements above. Figures and quotes belong to the original sources.
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