THUNDER BAY – A local tech company has been awarded a $2.48-million federal contract.
Cirro by AirSuite announced on Friday that its flight operation management system was selected for use by the Aircraft Services Directorate, the air operator within Canada.
The directorate is responsible for providing, maintaining, and modifying aircraft and providing services to the Canadian Coast Guard, Department of Fisheries and Oceans, Department of National Defence, and other important groups within the federal government.
Cirro will provide a whole host of services including compliance software for tracking flights, weight and balance passenger manifesting, and a fit-to-fly list among other things.
“It's kind of hard for me to sum this up in a very quick way, because it's such an over encompassing product that is not only just for pilots. It's for the actual ground users, the staff, the administrative people to really pull all of the flight operations into a single solution that really increases your productivity,” said CEO Michael Kleywegt.
“For the government end of things as well, they receive a lot of FOI requests, and that became a very cumbersome way to work with these requests with their legacy software systems. So, by implementing our solution, they're going to be saving millions of dollars going forward, being able to service requests and really increase their productivity internally.”
The $2.48 million contract is in place for three years with a seven-year option. Kleywegt said that it will allow the company to further expand.
“It marks a phenomenal moment for the company and for our current growth as well. This individual deal has allowed us to hire an additional five more employees,” he said.
“So, we're up to 19 employees now, and we're building out a whole new 2,200 square foot expansion space so we'll be able to house an additional 17 employees here locally in Thunder Bay.”
Thunder Bay Mayor Ken Boshcoff, said this deal really solidifies the city's position as a technological leader in the region.
“It all reinforces each other, whether it's our technology hub, the university, the college the graduates coming out and the students coming here and seeing how many opportunities there are,” he said. “This is the real thing.”
Kleywegt said he has been committed to the city since he first moved here 14 years ago, and that's why he intends to keep his business here.
“The community support here has been phenomenal. I wouldn't have been able to achieve this at all without the support this community has fed into this company to bring it here to this day,” he said.
“I'm (part of this) community and I'm a family person as well and I fully intend on returning that favour in spades back to the community.”
