VP, Deputy General Counsel (Real Estate & Development)

At Montera, we’re building the future of digital infrastructure. Founder-led with $1.5B backed by Stonepeak, Montera is driven by a future-focused vision: to develop and operate hyperscale data centers essential for tomorrow's technology. Our mission is to deliver strategically located, hyperscale data centers designed for speed, reliability, and scalability. Backed by decades of experience in design, construction, and operations, we don’t just build—we execute with purpose. 

Our Values 

·       Client First Alignment: We align every solution to our clients’ goals. 

·       Speed with Certainty: Velocity matters. We deliver with urgency and precision. 

·       Operational Excellence: Decades of experience drive our high standards. 

·       Safety & Integrity: Safety is non-negotiable. We lead with integrity and transparency. 

·       Ownership Mentality: We think like owners, because we are. 

The Opportunity 

Montera is seeking a VP, Deputy General Counsel (Real Estate & Development) to lead the legal work for land acquisition, entitlement, and construction across Montera's data center portfolio and to help build the legal department as the company scales. Reporting to the Chief Legal Officer, this position is one of three planned functional roles, each ultimately responsible for a distinct area of the business (Job Level M7 — VP or SVP).

The role owns acquisition, site control, entitlements, construction and EPC contracts, condominium structures, and ground-lease financeability. It is responsible for ensuring that risk Montera accepts in a customer lease passes through to the related construction, land, and financing documents. The role also supports financing and board matters and helps establish the templates, playbooks, outside-counsel panel, and systems the legal function requires. It requires deep real estate, development, and construction experience together with broad generalist judgment developed in close partnership with a business. It partners with Development, Design & Construction, Delivery, Procurement, Finance, and Commercial, and requires regular travel to sites, jurisdictions, lenders, and counterparties.

What You’ll Do 

·       Exercise delegated authority from the Chief Legal Officer across real estate, development, and construction matters, and represent the Legal function directly with the business, counterparties, lenders, and local authorities.

·       Own land acquisition and site control — purchase and option agreements, ground leases, title, survey, easements and access rights, and diligence and option periods structured to preserve time to secure power and entitlements.

·       Direct zoning, annexation, entitlement, and permitting strategy in partnership with land-use counsel — permitting contingencies, conditions of approval, environmental conditions, and water rights.

·       Lead negotiation of design, construction, and EPC contracts — delay liquidated damages, contractor liability caps, performance guarantees, warranties, insurance, collateral assignment, and lender step-in rights.

·       Flow down delivery dates, delay credits, and technical requirements from data center leases into the construction and procurement contracts, so that schedule and liability risk pass through to the responsible counterparties.

·       Support data center lease negotiation and post-signature compliance in partnership with the CLO and the Energy DGC (delivery obligations, force majeure, delay credits, tenant termination rights), and structure condominium, parcelization, and platting arrangements on multi-tenant campuses (shared-infrastructure cost allocation, association governance, and alignment with each tenant's lease).

·       Support project financing and lender diligence — ground-lease financeability, leasehold-mortgagee protections, SNDAs, estoppels, and lender acceptability of condominium structures — and prepare Board materials and resolutions, supporting sponsor governance and consent processes across real estate and construction matters.

·       Build the legal department in partnership with the CLO — templates and playbooks, matter intake, contract lifecycle management, the outside-counsel panel (including land-use and construction firms, run to budget), and the obligations and change-of-control registers; define, recruit, and mentor the roles added as the function scales; provide training to the business; and establish the standards for responsive, commercially practical legal support.