Kaufman & Company has announced BUILD 2030, a national development initiative that unites its housing, real estate, construction, technology, and AI infrastructure capabilities under a single coordinated investment and development strategy. The move matters because it challenges the conventional separation of physical and digital infrastructure at a time when America's next infrastructure cycle is increasingly defined by two pressing needs: places for people to live and computing capacity to support an AI-driven economy.
The initiative is grounded in more than 25 years of development experience across the Kaufman platform, representing over $2 billion in project value and more than 10,000 housing units developed. BUILD 2030 will coordinate projects and investment across operating companies that span residential development, build-to-rent, workforce and affordable housing, custom housing, commercial and hospitality development, AI infrastructure, real estate advisory, and venture capital.
At the core of the strategy is what Kaufman calls "infrastructure convergence." Housing requires land, power, transportation, entitlement expertise, construction capacity, and capital. AI infrastructure requires many of the same inputs. By recognizing these shared dependencies, Kaufman aims to gain a significant advantage in the next decade. "The real estate industry still tends to put everything into separate boxes: multifamily, build-to-rent, affordable housing, data centers, technology," said Daniel Kaufman, Founder and Principal of Kaufman & Company. "We don't see it that way. We see land, infrastructure, housing, technology and capital increasingly colliding. BUILD 2030 is our response to that."
The implications extend beyond operational efficiency. BUILD 2030 also emphasizes community impact when evaluating future AI infrastructure locations. Rather than treating data centers as isolated industrial projects, Kaufman & Company intends to explore opportunities where infrastructure investment can support broader economic development, including workforce housing, community improvements, and local employment. "We don't want to be the developer that arrives in a community, consumes power and leaves behind a box," Kaufman said. "The better model is to ask what else our investment can unlock for the people who already live there."
This community-first approach could set a new standard for how AI infrastructure is sited and developed, potentially reducing local opposition and creating more sustainable outcomes. It also positions Kaufman & Company to capitalize on synergies between its existing businesses, which include residential and mixed-use development, workforce and affordable housing, build-to-rent communities, hospitality, AI infrastructure, and a venture portfolio developing technology for the real estate industry.
BUILD 2030 will serve as the connective strategy across those businesses as the company evaluates its next generation of projects and partnerships. "We've spent 25 years building real estate. The next 25 will be about building the infrastructure around it," Kaufman said. For an industry often criticized for siloed thinking, the initiative represents a notable bet that the future belongs to developers who can master both physical and digital infrastructure. As AI continues to reshape the economy, Kaufman & Company's integrated platform may offer a template for others to follow, ensuring that the infrastructure boom benefits both machines and people.
