Along the way, new service lines have helped expand the firm’s business footprint while deepening its capabilities. Yet a constant from the time MMR first opened its doors until today is a commitment to the electrical and instrumentation business, particularly for heavy industrial and manufacturing projects, says James “Pepper” Rutland, founder, president and CEO.

“Rather than wandering off to other sectors that maybe we might not be good at, we’ve strived to achieve excellence in trying to be the best electrical contractor, with the best personnel to do this work,” he says. “It’s a high bar to maintain.”

Based on its recent financial performance, MMR would appear to have no difficulties meeting that challenge—one of many factors that contributed to its selection as the 2025 Specialty Contractor of the year for the Texas & Louisiana region. Reported nationwide revenue for all MMR Group companies last year marked a nearly 67% increase from the previous year. Although MMR did not respond to the ENR Texas & Louisiana 2024 Specialty Contractors survey, Rutland says robust activity this past year across the region—especially in liquefied natural gas (LNG) and data center/artificial intelligence construction sectors—has kept the company’s 10 Louisiana and Texas locations on the go.

Rutland adds that a host of nationwide influences “has pushed all contractors to an extreme that I don’t think anybody saw coming, at least not quite to this extent.”

In January, MMR Group announced that its craftsmen training center had been certified by the U.S. Dept. of Labor and the state of Louisiana for its apprenticeship program.
Photo courtesy of MMR Group

Scaling Up to Meet Demands

Because many of MMR’s client relationships are bound by confidentiality agreements, the firm declined to provide details on most of its current major projects.

Rutland did share with ENR that the firm is preparing to start work on developer Venture Global’s CP2 LNG export facility, located on a 1,150-acre site in Cameron Parish, La. With a minimum export capacity of at least 20 million tonnes per year, the project will double the size of the company's recently commissioned CP1 LNG facility, for which MMR also provided electrical and instrumentation services.

For the new terminal, Rutland says, MMR will be the project’s only electrical contractor, involved in both the plant’s power block and the liquefaction processes.

“It’s a massive project that will require a very large workforce in a very remote part of the state,” he says.

MMR says its work in telecommunications and security systems sector under its mission critical service line helped it achieve a milestone in 2024, surpassing 1.5GW of capacity by supporting work on complex facility upgrades and hyperscale megaprojects.

Because such projects demand that contractors be ready to respond on short notice, MMR bolstered its prefabrication capabilities this year by retrofitting a Lafayette Parish manufacturing building into a facility for producing modularized server racks and other electrical components.

Rutland says the $55.2-million investment will also continue the company’s long-standing relationship with the area’s workforce.

“It made it a natural fit when we found the right facility that could be converted for this purpose,” he says.

Similarly, MMR added advanced equipment to its 40,000-sq-ft Baton Rouge Integration and Panel Fabrication Center. A new fiber laser and press brake will allow the facility to design and fabricate a wider range of electrical and instrumentation specialty components such as electrical and control systems, racks and enclosures.

Other branches of MMR’s business marked milestones in the past year as well. The company introduced a new utility services division to provide power system EPC capabilities from offices in Conroe, Texas, and Brookhaven, Miss.

Fabricated Pipe Co., a longtime affiliate company acquired by MMR in 2023, marked the completion of a major upgrade and renovation effort at its Fernwood, Miss., production center. The improvements include a 58,000-sq-ft building with 5- and 10-ton bridge cranes, two 6,000-sq-ft covered paint shops and other facilities that will provide needed capacity to supply pipes for MMR’s industrial and manufacturing projects.

Rutland considers these and other initiatives to be part of MMR’s overall horizontal integration strategy. “Everything that touches [electrical and instrumentation] we’re interested in doing,” he says.

A big driver of MMR’s growth has been self-performed electrical construction as well as work in tele-communications and security systems through its mission critical service line.
Photo courtesy of MMR Group

Stemming a Workforce Shortage

MMR’s ability to safely and efficiently meet the demands of these challenging efforts is evidenced by a awards and accolades it has collected over the years.

Most recently, MMR’s major upgrade of power and communications systems at an ExxonMobil refinery gas compressor unit in Baton Rouge earned the company recognition from the Associated Builders and Contractors at both the chapter and national levels for maintaining exceptional safety standards during the year-long project, which preserved the operation of 12 waste gas flares at the plant.

David Pugh, chair of the ABC national board of directors, had high praise for MMR’s “unrelenting commitment to jobsite safety.” Speaking at the organization’s National Excellence in Construction Awards event last May, Pugh said the company’s leadership and employees “make a choice every day to create a culture that refuses to compromise on safety, relentlessly ensuring every employee leaves the jobsite in the same or better condition every day.”

Through the firm's MMR University, interns complete a two-and-a-half-year program that combines classroom instruction, virtual learning, hands-on lessons and immersive field placements for college students interested in construction.
Photo courtesy of MMR Group

In-House Training

To ensure MMR maintains its standards for safe and high-quality work, the company has aggressively developed and enhanced its in-house training programs and resources.

The contractor already boasts a 15,000-sq-ft training center for craft and supervisory employees and says it is increasing company capacity to meet growing workforce demands with the recent completion of another 20,000-sq-ft building that will be used primarily for office space.

Additional facility renovations are also planned, according to the company.

While MMR has used the Associated Builders and Contractors’ craft training curriculum as a blueprint for its own programs, the company has also developed modularized task training for critical components of larger projects.

“We’ve also invested in preparing master trainers, who can bring this training to other parts of the company,” Rutland adds.

MMR has received recognition from Associated Builders and Contractors for recent upgrades at an ExxonMobil refinery gas compressor unit in Baton Rouge.
Photo courtesy of MMR Group

Preparing for the Future

Another recent initiative, MMR University, aims to provide the company with a reliable recruitment pipeline.

The training program involves a 30-month internship that complements participants’ higher education and/or professional experience with technical instruction and field experience at MMR projects. This year, MMR University “graduated” its first cohort of participants.

“They get to see all the parts and pieces of how projects work and develop capabilities that we think will accelerate their development during their initial years as full-time employees,” Rutland points out. “They’ll come out knowing the things we really want them to know.”

That will be critical for sustaining MMR’s success, according to the CEO, as supplying sufficient qualified labor remains a chronic industrywide challenge, particularly for markets where electrical and instrumentation services remain in high demand for the foreseeable future.

“The market is very robust in about every area—oil and gas, LNG, data centers—and I don’t see that significantly changing this year or for the next several years,” Rutland says. “We’re looking for continued growth through financial strength and being able to supply the biggest shortage [overall]—which is qualified labor. That’s everybody’s problem, and it’s going to be a problem for some time.”