A Thunder Bay aviation IT company has landed a contract to provide an Internet-based flight information display system for a new airport terminal at the Grand Forks (North Dakota) Regional Airport Authority.
iFIDS.com a subsidiary of the Thunder Bay International Airports Authority, specializes in web-based software solutions for airports and airlines throughout North America.
Their system provides air travellers with the arrival and departure information posted on display monitors. To date, they count airport clients in Hamilton, London, Kamloops, Kelowna, Prince George, Deer Lake (Newfoundland-Labrador) and internationally in Duluth, Minn. and Nassau in the Bahamas.
iFIDS is a joint venture between Thunder Bay International Airport and Aviation InterTech, a Thunder Bay software company specializing in aircraft maintenance record-keeping systems.
With the addition of a new marketing man, iFIDS has two full-time employees The software code-writing skills are provided by Aviation Intertec. Annual sales exceed a quarter million dollars annually.
The company has identified a target market of about 1,000 small and regional airports in the U.S.
"We feel there's a niche there," said Thunder Bay International Airport Authority CEO Scott McFadden, who also doubles as iFIDS president. "Even though we've been doing this since 1999, we still feel the need to develop a track record before getting into the bigger and more customized projects of larger airports."
The small company started soon after Ottawa handed over management and operations of the airport in Thunder Bay, and in many other communities, over to local control in the late 1990s. The new airport authority wanted to upgrade their flight information display system in the terminal and put out a request for proposals.
The bids they received were exorbitantly high and the systems offered really weren't much of an improvement over what they had displayed on their old existing black and white television sets. McFadden posed the problem to Eric Hansen of Aviation Intertec, who came up with a custom solution.
"We didn't really know how revolutionary it was at the time," said McFadden, which has since been copied by other competitors.
When air travellers gaze up at a display screen for arrivals and departures, what they're seeing is an internet browser.
For customers, the iFIDS system is basically a plug-and-play format. An airport's existing hardware systems does not require any specialized software installation.
"We set up the PC here and ship it to them in a box, they unpack it, install it and off it goes," said McFadden.
iFIDS provides all the back office IT support. The system is a hosted service with the servers and with all the maintenance performed in Thunder Bay.
"When you're in Toronto and look at the screen and see West Jet's flight information, the actual data behind that information is coming from Thunder Bay."
Fresh information can be posted daily by airport operators through a password-protected system. They can even build and customize their display screen in a matter of minutes with their own colours and font sizes.
"It's infinitely variable in how a user can set it up," said McFadden.
Beside flight information, airports can run advertising and general information like weather data. Local and regional carriers can upload their schedules into the system and update them through any internet connected device. Marketed as a low-cost, user-friendly and practical system. McFadden said the Grand Forks contract is worth $20,000 with ongoing annual maintenance fees in the $3,000 to $5,000 range.
iFIDS is one of three aviation-related subsidiary companies in the Thunder Bay Airport Authority's stable that includes Aileron aeronautical billing software and Sleeping Giant Enterprise, a distributor for Boschung AG, makers of runway maintenance and snow-clearing equipment.
McFadden said it's an uphill climb to convince management at large international airports that a Thunder Bay aviation technology company can produce a low-cost web product that's adequate for their needs.
"Some airports spend a large amount of money to get what they perceive as high-end product, but other respects, they seem to be a resistant to look at new technologies."
Nevertheless they have sold pieces of runway cleaning equipment to airports in Toronto, St. John's, Fort McMurray and Victoria.
