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Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/1119976
JUNE 2019 BCBUSINESS 13 COURTESY OF VIKING AIR W hen Dave Curtis calls in early February, it's the seventh time our interview has been rescheduled over the course of three months. The CEO of Viking Air has been a very busy man—and, if truth be told, a bit worried about talking to the media in the wake of his blockbuster deal, announced last November, to acquire Bombardier's Dash-8 program and the de Havilland trademark for about $300 million. "I have lawyers putting the fear of God into me around the Competition Board process— not wanting to get out ahead of all that. The good news is that we received our clearance certi‰cate from Canada and the U.S. last week," says the 57-year- old Curtis from his snowed-in home o'ce in Victoria. The only hurdle remaining, when we talk, is making sure all systems are in place for Trans- port Canada—a process expect- ed to wrap up by summer. For most of its 50 years, Viking has "own under the public radar. The business started in 1970 in Sidney, next to Victoria International Air- port, as an aircraft parts and modi‰cation shop. In 1983, the company was selected by de Havilland Canada ( DHC) to be the exclusive spare parts manufacturer and distributor for its Beaver (Dash-2) and Otter (Dash-3) planes—and by 2005, Bombardier (then-owner of de Havilland) had sold the rights of all out-of-production DHC planes to Viking, the Dash-1 through Dash-7. In a bold move beyond its core parts-and- service business, Viking put the Dash-6—otherwise known as the Twin Otter—back into pro- duction in February 2010. Since then, nearly 150 400œSeries Twin Otter aircraft have made their way through the Viking production facilities in Sidney and Calgary, where there's a ‰nal assembly line. "I think we're in 27 or 30 dižer- ent countries now," Curtis says. "I was on the phone with my sales team this morning, and we were discussing opportunities in Africa and Indonesia." Viking's head count has risen from 60, when Curtis became CEO in 1991, to just un- der 700 today. Ready for Takeoff Viking Air makes a bold move into Eastern Canada with its purchase of Bombardier's Dash-8 program —and reshapes the Canadian aerospace industry by Matt O'Grady AV I AT ION ( the informer ) O N T H E R ADA R THE DE HAVILLAND LEGACY In January 2019, Long- view Aviation Capital Corp.–the investment arm that controls Viking Air–announced that it would resur- rect the de Havilland brand, with Viking's Eastern operations to become the de Havil- land Aircraft Company of Canada. (Longview is majority owned by Thomson family heir Sherry Brydson, Canada's richest woman, through her Victoria-based Wester- kirk Capital) 1928: de Havilland Aircraft of Canada (DHC) is formed by the British aircraft manufacturer to build Moth light aircraft for the Royal Canadian Air Force 1946: DHC's first postwar aviation craft, the DHC-1 Chipmunk, is launched 1962: DHC assumes control of the Avro Canada aircraft production facility 1974: After flag- ging sales of its Dash-7 aircraft, British owners Hawker Siddeley Aviation sell DHC to the Canadian government (cont'd. on p.14) A HIGHER PLANE With its Dash-8 buy, Viking becomes a US$1.5-billion outfit