JLL’s Matt Landek will lead the newly formed data center operations firm L5 Mission Critical.

L5 Mission Critical, a new data center operations and management firm, has appointed Matt Landek as its first president and CEO.

Landek previously spent 14 years at JLL, most recently serving as president of its data centers and critical environments division in Chicago. He joined the brokerage in 2012 as an account executive and was promoted to his current role in late 2024, according to his LinkedIn profile. In that position, he oversaw employees across 340 data centers, a tenure that coincided with the rapid expansion of JLL’s data center business.

Launched on Wednesday by Detroit-based construction company Walbridge, L5 Mission Critical was established to meet growing demand for data center operations. Headquartered in Chicago, the firm will provide operations, facilities management, and workforce training to third-party data center clients nationwide, as well as to Walbridge’s construction clients.

Landek will work alongside John Rakolta III, president and chief administrative officer of Walbridge. “Matt’s expertise will allow us to scale our data center construction practice to a full build-to-operate model that our clients need in this complicated time,” said Rakolta. “With the addition of L5 Mission Critical, our clients will be able to tap into a wider depth of service that goes across the entire life cycle of a data center.”

A JLL spokesperson told Commercial Observer in a statement: “Matt Landek was a valued member of JLL for many years. We thank him for his numerous contributions and wish him well in this next endeavor.”

Before joining JLL, Landek worked in facilities management for the Cook County government in Illinois. He holds a degree in finance from the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Emily Davis can be reached at edavis@commercialobserver.com.