Huron-Backed Exigent Buys Columbus Contractor Superior Building Services

What happened

The Exigent Group, a mechanical services platform and portfolio company of Detroit private equity firm Huron Capital, has acquired Superior Building Services, a mechanical contractor headquartered in Columbus, Ohio. Huron announced the deal on June 24, 2026, describing it as extending Exigent's presence into the Columbus market. Honigman advised Exigent on the transaction, with a deal team led by partners Eric M. Jones and Jeremy Scherlinck. The announcement did not disclose financial terms.

The seller

Superior specializes in boiler, chiller and HVAC service and retrofit work, serving education, food and beverage, healthcare and government customers across the greater Columbus region. It services and repairs all equipment brands around the clock and takes residential calls alongside its commercial and industrial work. Recent jobs include a cast-iron sectional steam boiler replacement at a public school, a packaged rooftop unit for a new office building in Lewis Center, and a tandem compressor replacement at an area hospital.

President Bill Detillion and Vice President Jason Abbott lead the company, and both will continue to lead local operations under Exigent. "We're excited to join Exigent and leverage the platform to accelerate our growth both within our existing footprint and in adjacent markets," Detillion said.

The buyer

Huron launched Exigent in 2022 through ExecFactor, its buy-and-build program for partnering with a leadership team to scale a services business. Based in Reston, Virginia, and led by chief executive Peter van Niekerk, Exigent provides HVAC, plumbing, engineering and energy efficiency services, along with mechanical repair, maintenance and replacement, to complex facilities for healthcare, education, industrial, government and commercial customers. Huron counts Superior as Exigent's eighth acquisition since its initial platform acquisition in late 2022.

Huron was founded in Detroit in 1999 and invests in mission-critical service companies in the infrastructure, facility and residential sectors. Van Niekerk tied the deal to Columbus demand: "We look forward to extending our presence in Ohio, particularly in the high-growth Columbus market, where well-funded school districts, state agencies, and large facility customers are driving sustained demand for mechanical services."

How Exigent has built out Ohio

Exigent's earlier Ohio deals ran through the northwest of the state. Smith-Boughan Mechanical, founded in 1927 and serving Northwest and West Central Ohio with HVAC, plumbing, controls, sheet metal fabrication and process piping, joined Exigent in July 2024. In January 2025, Exigent and Smith-Boughan acquired Premier Mechanical, a Lima commercial and industrial HVAC contractor that serves commercial customers from Toledo to Columbus to Cleveland, and integrated it into Smith-Boughan as Exigent's Ohio operating company.

The Superior announcement names Exigent alone as the acquirer. Owners weighing a similar sale can read our guide to selling an HVAC business to private equity.

What this means for Columbus HVAC owners

Until June, Exigent's reach into Columbus ran through Premier in Lima. It now owns a contractor based in the city, and its chief executive has named the demand he sees there: school districts, state agencies and large facility customers. Superior's recent work, a public school steam boiler and a hospital compressor, fits that description. For mechanical contractors in Columbus whose service book runs through similar customers, the local competitor for those accounts now sits inside a sponsor-backed platform whose CEO has pointed to exactly that customer base.

OffDeal is an advisory firm that helps lower-middle-market business owners sell with confidence. Reach out to learn more about our expertise with HVAC businesses in Ohio.

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Source: Huron Capital - https://www.huroncapital.com/news/huron-capitals-the-exigent-group-acquires-superior-building-services-in-ohio/