Short answers, pulled from the story.
Black and Veatch was founded in 1915 in Kansas City, Missouri, by Ernest Bateman Black and Nathan Thomas Veatch. The two men had met while attending the University of Kansas, and Black formed the new firm after dissolving an earlier partnership.
Black and Veatch is headquartered at 11401 Lamar Avenue in Overland Park, Kansas. The company designated this building its World Headquarters in 2009 after repurchasing it.
As of October 2025, Black and Veatch employs approximately 13,000 people and reported total revenue of $4.735 billion. It ranks as the 5th-largest 100% employee-owned company in the United States.
Black and Veatch served as the Integrating Contractor for the first Biological Threat Reduction Integrating Contract in Ukraine, awarded by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency in 2008. In 2010 the firm commissioned Ukraine's first Bio-Safety Level 3 laboratory, training Ukrainian personnel in molecular diagnostics and laboratory management over three years.
Social media users have attempted to link Black and Veatch's biosurveillance work in Ukraine to theories about COVID-19's origins and the war in Ukraine. The Associated Press reported that the firm signed an agreement in late 2019 for biological threat reduction work, and later hired Labyrinth Gold Health for Ukraine's COVID-19 response; the original agreement date was not updated when the project description changed, which fueled misleading claims.
Black and Veatch announced in 2020 that it was ceasing participation in new coal-based design and construction projects, shifting its focus toward renewable energy work.