Eric Hirani.
Eric Hirani, 31
Founder and president at Infinite Consulting Group
Eric Hirani grew up the son of an engineer. Add to that that the Long Islander was good at math, and his career path was settled before high school graduation. He would start his own business in the field while earning a degree in civil engineering at Columbia.
It was a fortuitous time. New York City and much of the rest of the country was shaking off the downturn of 2008-2009, and construction volume was picking up considerably. Infinite’s first project was a comfort station in Washington Square Park. From that, Hirani has networked his company into projects across the country. “I think I’m very lucky that I had some really good clients around,” he told CO. “I think we’re very good at making sure we’re meeting their tasks and meeting their requirements.”
Of the more than 100 projects the company has worked on so far, Infinite’s biggest has been a project in Queens that involves a 1.2 million-square-foot expansion of exhibition space with 27 new loading docks and a 1-acre rooftop farm that is supposed to produce 40,000 pounds of food annually.
During the past 12 months, too, Hirani’s firm has worked on a $400 million project, which includes two new buildings and 667 housing units plus 25,000 square feet of retail. This project has demanded the engineering feat of baking in Long Island Rail Road and subway tracks to the overall design. (He declined to name either project.)
As for work in general during the more recent months—read: during COVID-19—Hirani is hopeful and sees opportunities, in fact, in work on projects for industries such as life sciences and healthcare, which have experienced an understandably heightened demand amid the pandemic.
“I’m optimistic,” Hirani said. “I don’t want to seem down on everything. It’s a tough time right now, but we’ll pull ourselves out of it. I think New Yorkers are resilient, I think Americans are resilient, and we’ll get there.”
