News
New projects highlight Manitoba’s aviation roots

The joint announcement sees the creation of a new facility to house the
world-class collection of bush aircraft and other one-of-a kind
artifacts of the Aviation Museum. Additionally EIC announced the
development of a state of the art maintenance facility for large
aircraft in its fleet of 100 aircraft. The transaction will see EIC
invest in a long term lease with WAA for 40 years on what is now the
WCAM site. Additionally, understanding the importance of preserving
where they've come from, EIC will contribute $2.5M towards the capital
campaign for the new WCAM purpose built site. EIC's four airlines have
operated for an average of 50 years.

On hand supporting the announcement, Manitoba Premier Greg Selinger
said, "By choosing to make James Richardson International Airport its
headquarters for aircraft maintenance and by creating so many
good-paying jobs for skilled technicians, Exchange Income Corporation
will strengthen Winnipeg's position as the Gateway to the North."
Premier Selinger continued, "This new high-tech facility, plus the new
larger home for the aviation museum will also provide a significant
economic boost for the airport and the region."

Barry Rempel, WAA's President and CEO agreed saying, "We are honoured to
be working with incredible partners, people, who standing on the
shoulders of a rich aviation heritage see a future of connectivity with
the emerging North". Rempel continued, "Enabling the development of
EIC's new aviation home leverages WAA assets in a way which provides
greater opportunities for the people of the region we serve."

"Critical to our success is having the infrastructure to make sure our
people have the right tools to do their work. We've announced our plans
to acquire Custom Helicopters and will be developing combined services
such as air ambulance using our newly acquired helicopter business. With
the growth of our existing passenger, cargo and air ambulance work,
we've simply run out of space in our current facilities. For our people
to contribute the best they can, we needed contiguous facilities and the
further development of our EIC campus in Winnipeg. This building will
facilitate our needs and future growth of our aviation companies", said
Mike Pyle, president/CEO of EIC. "We're focused on providing our
customers and the communities we serve the very best product in the most
cost effective manner," he continued.

Ross Robinson, the co-chair of the WCAM Capital Committee said, "This is
wonderful news for Canada's, if not the world's, best collection of
historically significant Bush aircraft and Canadian aviation artifacts.
Thanks to the hard work on behalf of the Province, the WAA, the Western
Canada Aviation Museum and EIC with their outstanding gift, our plans
are underway to relocate directly next to the new terminal building in a
fabulous new facility. Like 1930 Fokker Super Universal in our
collection, the second such James Richardson purchased to open up
Canada's North, we have many one-of-a-kind examples of bush aircraft
retrieved from forests, tundra, mountainsides and even the bottom of
lakes. We're very grateful for EIC's generous gift.