22 septembre 2024 | Local, Sécurité
Raytheon Company was registered this past week by Daniel MacIsaac, a consultant with CFN Consultants.
https://www.ipolitics.ca/news/major-defence-contractor-lobbying-feds-on-procurement-opportunities
14 août 2024 | Local, Terrestre
The Liberal government's recent internal budget cutting exercise at the Department of National Defence (DND) has deprived the army's system for maintaining equipment and vehicles of up to $150 million, CBC News has learned.
15 novembre 2017 | Local, Aérospatial
Posted on November 15, 2017 by Chris Thatcher The in-service support and training systems team behind Canada's new fixed-wing search and rescue (FWSAR) aircraft expects to begin construction on a training centre at 19 Wing Comox, B.C., before the end of the year. Eva Martinez, PAL Aerospace vice president of in-service support, said the first shovel should break ground in December. “We're working on finalizing that date,” she told the Best Defence Conference in London, Ont., on Nov. 1. Canada's 16 C295W aircraft will likely be distributed three per base, with two marked for training and two to be rotated amongst the SAR squadrons to cover for aircraft undergoing maintenance. Airbus Photo The Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) will take delivery of the first of 16 Airbus C295W search and rescue aircraft in April 2020 at a renewed main operating base at 19 Wing, scheduled to be stood up in December 2019. Airbus was awarded a $2.4 billion contract in December 2016 to replace the RCAF's fleet of six CC-115 Buffalos and several CC-130H Hercules assigned to search and rescue duty. The contract includes delivery of the aircraft, construction of a state-of-the-art training centre, and the first five years of maintenance and support. Options for an additional 15 years of maintenance and support services could extend the agreement to 2042 and the total value to $4.7 billion. As part of the Airbus team, PAL Aerospace will provide program management services, in-service support (ISS), maintenance and logistics support, heavy maintenance, a mobile repair team, and manage a centralized supply chain. The two companies have created a Canadian joint venture called AirPro to serve as the ISS integrator. And as a Tier 1 supplier to Airbus, PAL will provide direct maintenance, repair and overall (MRO) services as well as logistics and engineering augmentation. While CAE Canada has responsibility for the training program, infrastructure and support, PAL has the task of creating a contractor field office and tool and parts warehouse and staffing an integrated team of aircraft maintenance engineers (AMEs) at the four main operating bases in Comox, Winnipeg, Trenton, Ont., and Greenwood, N.S. It will also set up a central warehouse in Winnipeg to supply all four bases, alongside an MRO facility for heavy inspections and the mobile repair party. An interim warehouse will be created in St. John's, N.L., until the Winnipeg facility is ready in December 2022. “Next year, we begin the wave of hiring,” said Martinez, noting that AMEs, a senior maintenance manager and other personnel will all need to be in place as the facilities and services at each main operating base come online, starting with Comox and then likely Winnipeg, Trenton and Greenwood, “though that may change.” This rendering shows the new fixed-wing search and rescue training centre to be built at 19 Wing Comox, B.C. CAE Image The 16 C295W aircraft will likely be distributed three per base, with two marked for training and two to be rotated amongst the SAR squadrons to cover for aircraft undergoing maintenance, she said. Although St. John's-based PAL has been providing airline, aviation and manufacturing services since 1972, establishing a global reputation in the process, the FWSAR contract has helped put the company “on the map” in Canada, Martinez acknowledged. As part of its central role in the program, PAL will be leaning on a wider supply chain of small and medium Canadian companies to achieve its industrial and technological benefits (ITB) obligations. “[We] will be expecting [our] suppliers to provide the support that we need so we too can meet our ITB and value proposition contractual commitments,” she said. As one of the first large projects to move through the procurement process since the government in 2014 introduced a defence procurement strategy emphasizing value propositions (VP) to enhance economic returns, the “FWSAR contract is actually the first in Canada to fall under a measured VP,” Martinez noted. “In other words, [the VP] wasn't just used for bid evaluation. A variety of tasks have already been pre-determined against which every Tier 1 will have to identify their labour hours specific to each of those tasks.” While Airbus will have an obligation to invest at least 15 per cent of its ITB commitments in small and medium enterprises, PAL's requirement is just 1.4 per cent. Martinez stressed, however, that the company would be looking well beyond that for additional Canadian content. “That does not mean we are going to cap ourselves at 1.4 per cent. We have just as much interest [as Airbus] in working with small and medium enterprises where it makes sense in terms of performance,” she said. https://www.skiesmag.com/news/pal-soon-hiring-sar-main-operating-bases/
10 mars 2020 | Local, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité
In the last election campaign the Liberals promised to create a defence procurement agency as part of its efforts to improve purchasing of equipment for the Canadian Forces. No details were released at the time. In December, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, in his mandate letter to Procurement Minister Anita Anand, outlined how she would lead an effort to bring “forward analyses and options for the creation of Defence Procurement Canada, to ensure that Canada's biggest and most complex National Defence and Canadian Coast Guard procurement projects are delivered on time and with greater transparency to Parliament.” Anand would do this with the support of the Minister of National Defence and the Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard, according to her mandate letter. At the time Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan claimed much of the work was already underway. “A lot of work has already started on (Defence Procurement Canada) and the goal of this is to make sure that we get the procurement projects done as quickly as possible to make sure the Canadian Armed Forces has what they need,” Sajjan told iPolitics the day before his mandate letter was released. Strangely, when asked about that work, Sajjan's department pointed out that he wasn't specifically referring to the DND and that Anand's Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC) had the lead on the file. So, Defense Watch requested the timetable for this effort. Among the questions asked of Anand's department was when the new agency could potentially be expected to be stood up, will there be consultations done and whether there were any concepts already put forward for the agency that could be shared with the public? If this were such an important effort then of course the department would have an idea of at least a timeline on how things might unfold. Here is the answer provided by PSPC: “The Minister of Public Services and Procurement has been tasked to work with partner departments to bring forward analyses and options for the creation of Defence Procurement Canada. Public Services and Procurement Canada is leading this work with support from National Defence, Canadian Coast Guard, and Innovation Sciences and Economic Development Canada. This initiative is aimed at ensuring that Canada's biggest, most complex procurement projects are delivered on time and with greater transparency to Parliament. Work on this important initiative has just begun.” This answer provides little more than what was in the mandate letter. No details on what actual work was being contemplated or taking place was provided. There is no schedule or target date for even producing options and reporting back to government on those. In fact, this PSPC answer seems to undercut Sajjan's earlier claims that “a lot” of work had already started even before the mandate letters were released. Some in the defence industry don't expect much to come from the Liberal election promise of a single defence procurement agency. They point out their case is bolstered when the department leading the initiative doesn't know, or can't provide, even a timetable for such an initiative. The public, as well as industry, will have to wait and see whether Defence Procurement Canada ever becomes a reality. (Analysis) https://ottawacitizen.com/news/national/defence-watch/government-doesnt-know-when-a-defence-procurement-agency-will-be-created