Electrical

What the work is

Electrical work, in a building, is everything behind the wall that depends on the distribution board: the supply, the lighting, the sockets, the data cabling, the detection and emergency systems, and increasingly vehicle charging and self-consumption. It is work of installing, extending and maintaining, done by electricians who hold qualifications of their own, and it is the one building trade where a mistake is paid for in fire or in electric shock.

The market in Portugal

Electrical installation is the largest of the building's technical trades in Portugal: 10,960 firms and 43,019 people on the payroll, with a turnover of €3,279 million in 2024 (INE, Sistema de Contas Integradas das Empresas). And it is also the most uneven. Almost 94% of firms have fewer than ten people, and all of them together account for a little over a quarter of the sector's turnover. On the other side, ten firms in the whole country have two hundred and fifty people or more and account for almost a quarter of turnover on their own. The middle, between the three-person firm and the large group, is thin. That is exactly where the solid local firms are, with an established name and a client book of their own.

10,960 firms in electrical installation, CAE Rev.3 43210. Source: INE, Sistema de Contas Integradas das Empresas, 2024.

43,019 people employed in electrical installation. Source: INE, Sistema de Contas Integradas das Empresas, 2024.

93.7% of firms have fewer than ten people on the payroll and account for 28.0% of the sector's turnover; the 67 firms with fifty people or more account for 41.9%. Calculated from INE, Sistema de Contas Integradas das Empresas, 2024.

Public statistics. Each figure carries its source and year.

Why it recurs

Revenue in electrical work repeats in three ways. The first is the contract: commercial and industrial clients keep an avença with their electrician, because a stoppage costs more than the contract does. The second is the law: electrical installations in service are subject to periodic inspection under the regime of the Direção-Geral de Energia e Geologia, and where the installation includes fire detection, alarm or emergency lighting, the verification required by the fire safety regime for buildings is added on top, which in higher-risk buildings is annual. The third is the breakdown, which picks no season and cannot be put off. None of the three depends on there being new construction.

What the law requires

Private electrical installations have a regime of their own in Portugal, overseen by the Direção-Geral de Energia e Geologia, and that regime is built in layers. The firm has to be authorised to carry out installations and has to have, on its staff, a technician responsible for execution, registered with the DGEG, who signs off the work done. For installations that remain in continued operation there is a second figure, the technician responsible for operation, with a separate credential. And the verification of installations in service falls to accredited inspection bodies, which are other companies, with inspectors of their own. Whoever carries out the work, whoever signs it off and whoever inspects it are separate figures, and that is what gives the regime its backbone.

To this is added the contractor's licence issued by IMPIC, the alvará, in the 4th category, whose class limits the value of work the firm may quote for, and the fire safety regime for buildings whenever the work includes detection, alarm or emergency lighting, with registration of the company with the Autoridade Nacional de Emergência e Proteção Civil and a named responsible technician for each category of equipment. Every new technology brings a layer of its own: electric vehicle charging now has certification procedures of its own. None of this is settled with a van and goodwill. This is where the barrier to entry shows, and it is also where you see why many good firms, with a single owner, reach a point at which the paperwork costs more than the work.

Where it is going

Half of Portugal's residential buildings were built before 1981 (INE, Censos 2021). The electrical installations in those buildings were sized for a home with far fewer appliances plugged in than today's, and that is what you find on site: boards at their limit, cable sections that no longer suffice, the absence of protections that have since become standard. Refurbishing an old building almost always means redoing the electrical installation, and that is the work that is growing.

50.2% of Portugal's residential buildings were built before 1981, 1,794,306 out of a total of 3,573,416. Source: INE, Censos 2021.

The electrical load in buildings is rising and the network is being prepared for it. In 2026 ERSE approved an E-REDES investment plan for the distribution network of €1.6 billion between 2026 and 2030, 89% more than the annual average of the previous decade. Portugal closed 2025 with around 15,600 public vehicle charging points and 6.8 GW of installed solar, against a national target of 20.4 GW in 2030. Heat pumps, which replace gas boilers, are new load inside the building: 105,000 were installed in 2024. All of this is electrician's work, and all of it calls for new boards, new protections and trained people to fit them. Training a field technician takes between one and three years, and there is no way to speed it up.

Why it interests us

It interests us because it is the largest of the building's technical trades and the most fragmented: almost 94% of the sector's firms have fewer than ten people (INE, 2024), and among them are very good companies with an established name in their area. It interests us because revenue does not depend on there being new construction: there are maintenance contracts, there are mandatory inspections, and there are breakdowns that do not wait. It interests us because the barrier is one of credentials and of trained people, and those things take years to build. And it interests us because demand grows for reasons that are not cyclical: more equipment plugged in, more vehicle charging, more self-consumption, more automation. These are companies to buy and keep.

What we look for in a company, in numbers: what we look for.