SRV Group has reorganised into four business areas from 1 October 2026 and added two members to its Corporate Executive Team. Jarkko Salmenoja becomes SVP, Data Centres, and Marko Palonen, most recently YIT's regional director for Northern Finland, becomes SVP, Northern Finland at the start of 2027.
Data centres move from a unit to a business area of their own
Until now, Data Centres sat inside the Business Premises, Helsinki Metropolitan Area business area. It now runs as a separate business area responsible for nationwide development, customer relationships and project delivery. Salmenoja has worked at SRV since August 2025 and previously held senior management roles at NCC, WSP Finland and YIT.
The pipeline explains the promotion. In March, SRV agreed to build a data centre in Lahti for Singapore-based DayOne, a contract expected to lift the order backlog by about 35% from the level in the fourth-quarter 2025 report. In December 2025, it started the EUR 54 million implementation phase of the LUMI AI Factory data centre in Kajaani with CSC. First-quarter 2026 order intake reached EUR 395.4 million, the highest of the decade, with DayOne named as a driver.
“Alongside our already strong contracting business, we seek growth in data centre construction, whose exceptionally large and rapidly growing market we have highlighted previously,” says Saku Sipola, President and CEO of SRV, in the press release.
Three regions now carry both residential and non-residential work, with an outside hire for the north
The Southern Finland, Western and Central Finland, and Northern Finland business areas are each responsible for both non-residential and residential construction in their markets. Jouni Forsman leads Southern Finland and Tero Karislahti leads Western and Central Finland.
Palonen is the external addition. He served for an extended period as YIT's regional director for Northern Finland and before that at Lemminkäinen. Project development, leasing and transactions for non-residential work are combined into one unit under Jorma Seppä, while the roughly 100-person Building Services unit moves to Internal Services.
“Geographically, we are strengthening our local presence across Finland and seeking growth beyond our current operating areas in Northern Finland, on the West Coast and in the Uusimaa region in both contracting and residential construction,” says Sipola.
The new structure has to deliver nearly all of SRV's 2026 profit in the second half
SRV broke even at the operative level in the first half, on revenue of EUR 340.2 million. The company guides 2026 revenue above EUR 800 million and operative operating profit of EUR 10 to 20 million, backed by an order backlog of EUR 1,023.9 million at the end of June. That leaves at least EUR 460 million of revenue and the full profit target for the second half, the period the new business areas start in.
Salmenoja takes over a business area with two named projects already in delivery, in Lahti and Kajaani, and Palonen arrives in January to build a region SRV wants to grow. The full-year results in early 2027 will be the first test of whether four business areas change SRV's profit, not just its reporting lines.
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SRV Group has reorganised into four business areas from 1 October 2026 and added two members to its Corporate Executive Team. Jarkko Salmenoja becomes SVP, Data Centres, and Marko Palonen, most recently YIT's regional director for Northern Finland, becomes SVP, Northern Finland at the start of 2027.
Data centres move from a unit to a business area of their own
Until now, Data Centres sat inside the Business Premises, Helsinki Metropolitan Area business area. It now runs as a separate business area responsible for nationwide development, customer relationships and project delivery. Salmenoja has worked at SRV since August 2025 and previously held senior management roles at NCC, WSP Finland and YIT.
The pipeline explains the promotion. In March, SRV agreed to build a data centre in Lahti for Singapore-based DayOne, a contract expected to lift the order backlog by about 35% from the level in the fourth-quarter 2025 report. In December 2025, it started the EUR 54 million implementation phase of the LUMI AI Factory data centre in Kajaani with CSC. First-quarter 2026 order intake reached EUR 395.4 million, the highest of the decade, with DayOne named as a driver.
“Alongside our already strong contracting business, we seek growth in data centre construction, whose exceptionally large and rapidly growing market we have highlighted previously,” says Saku Sipola, President and CEO of SRV, in the press release.
Three regions now carry both residential and non-residential work, with an outside hire for the north
The Southern Finland, Western and Central Finland, and Northern Finland business areas are each responsible for both non-residential and residential construction in their markets. Jouni Forsman leads Southern Finland and Tero Karislahti leads Western and Central Finland.
Palonen is the external addition. He served for an extended period as YIT's regional director for Northern Finland and before that at Lemminkäinen. Project development, leasing and transactions for non-residential work are combined into one unit under Jorma Seppä, while the roughly 100-person Building Services unit moves to Internal Services.
“Geographically, we are strengthening our local presence across Finland and seeking growth beyond our current operating areas in Northern Finland, on the West Coast and in the Uusimaa region in both contracting and residential construction,” says Sipola.
The new structure has to deliver nearly all of SRV's 2026 profit in the second half
SRV broke even at the operative level in the first half, on revenue of EUR 340.2 million. The company guides 2026 revenue above EUR 800 million and operative operating profit of EUR 10 to 20 million, backed by an order backlog of EUR 1,023.9 million at the end of June. That leaves at least EUR 460 million of revenue and the full profit target for the second half, the period the new business areas start in.
Salmenoja takes over a business area with two named projects already in delivery, in Lahti and Kajaani, and Palonen arrives in January to build a region SRV wants to grow. The full-year results in early 2027 will be the first test of whether four business areas change SRV's profit, not just its reporting lines.
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