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Investor Kit
Navtech creates and supports superior flight operations software for airlines. Navtech's software
provides a competitive edge to airlines by facilitating significant costs savings in fuel consumption
and crew planning, two areas that represent a majority of an airline's variable operating
expenditures.
With more than 200 airline customers around the world, Navtech's software directly supports millions of flights around the globe each year. Navtech’s customer base has been built over 20 years, and includes customers in over 25 countries. These airlines include international airlines such as Delta Air Lines and Air Canada; low-cost airlines such as Jet Blue and Virgin Express; and smaller national or regional airlines such as Portugalia Airlines and Air Madagascar. Exceptional customer service has led
to long-term relationships dating back to Navtech’s founding.
Navtech has a fully rounded product portfolio that includes charting, navigational data, flight planning, crew planning, runway analysis, and mass & balance systems. Navtech has achieved strong organic revenue growth with a revenue model that provides over 80% recurring revenue, and has maintained fifteen consecutive quarters of profitability. Navtech has more than 250 employees with offices in the United States, Canada, Sweden, the United Kingdom and Singapore.
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Revenue |
US $36.8 million (FY 2006) |
Listing |
OTCBB: NAVH |
Fiscal Year End |
October 31st |
In operation |
Over 20 years |
Employees |
260 |
Customers |
Over 250 Globally |
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Main Office
295 Hagey Blvd. Suite 200
Waterloo, Ontario
N2L 6R5 Canada
Global Locations
Canada
United States
United Kingdom
Sweden
Singapore
Investor Relations
+1 (519) 747.1170 Ext. 288
Email: ir@navtechinc.com
View further filings online at U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission
Executive Bios
David Strucke has served as our President, Chief Executive Officer, Secretary and a director since November 2001. Mr. Strucke also
served as our Chief Financial Officer from January 2000 to November 2003. Mr. Strucke served as Vice President, Finance & Accounting of
Navtech-Canada from October 1999 to January 2000 and as its Director of Finance and Accounting and a Business Analyst from January 1999 to
October 1999. Prior to joining us, Mr. Strucke served as a Financial Analyst focusing on mergers and acquisitions and performed financial
and accounting consulting work from 1996 to 1998. Mr. Strucke obtained a Masters of Business Administration from Wilfrid Laurier University
a graduate of the University of Waterloo with a Bachelor’s degree in Science in Engineering. Mr. Strucke has lectured on Introductory
Finance for the undergraduate business program at Wilfrid Laurier University.
Gordon Kilpatrick joined Navtech as Chief Financial Officer in March 2007. Mr. Kilpatrick is a Chartered Accountant and a graduate
of the University of Waterloo with a Master of Accounting degree. Prior to joining Navtech, Mr. Kilpatrick served as the Vice-President
Finance at Shur-Gain (a division of Maple Leaf Foods Inc.) from 2001 to 2006, and as a self employed consultant from 1999 to 2001. Prior to
1999, Mr. Kilpatrick served in progressive financial positions at MDC Partners Inc. ending as Senior Vice-President Finance, Treasurer & Corporate Secretary.
Britt Bowra joined Navtech in 1996 and has held a variety of progressive management positions primarily in the areas of sales, marketing, and product management,
most recently serving as Vice President Client Services. Britt is a graduate of the University of Western Ontario with an Honours
degree in Business Administration. Prior to joining Navtech, Britt has held a number of sales management, marketing and finance positions
at AT&T Canada, NCR and Noranda Inc.
Mike Neudoerffer joined Navtech as Vice President Software Development in April 2006. Mike is a Professional Engineer and a graduate of
the University of Waterloo (1988) with a Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering. Prior to joining Navtech, Mike served as Chief Technology
Officer at CipherPass Corp., Vice President Operations and Development at HotButton Solutions Inc., Vice President Technical Operations at NE2
and Vice President Engineering at Wireless Matrix Corporation. Prior to these positions Mike served in software development positions with
progressive responsibility in factory automation, digital satellite communications, digital security, oil and gas production monitoring. Mike
is a private pilot and an avid flyer.
Johan Holmqvist joined the Navtech senior management team as Vice President Operations in November 2005 as part of Navtech's acquisition of
European Aeronautical Group (EAG). Prior to his current appointment, Johan has held a variety of management positions in EAG since 1990
including Vice President of Product and Business Development, CIO, and the Director Product Route Manual for Scandinavian Airlines (SAS).
Johan holds degrees in Mechanical Engineering, Marketing, and Navigation.
Financial Documents (SEC Filings)
PDF files may require Adobe Acrobat Reader®. You can download this software free of charge from
the Adobe website (www.adobe.com).
The Annual Meeting of Shareholders will be held at the office of our Canadian subsidiary, located at Suite 200, 295 Hagey Blvd, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
N2L 6R5 on Friday March 30, 2007 at 10:00a.m., local time. The record date has been set as February 20, 2007.
Corporate History
Navtech, Inc. (Navtech-US) was originally incorporated in the State of New York in 1981 and then
reincorporated in the State of Delaware in 1987. Navtech Systems Support Inc. (Navtech-Canada), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Navtech-US, was incorporated in the Province of Ontario in 1987. Navtech (UK) Limited (Navtech-UK), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Navtech-Canada, was incorporated in the United Kingdom in 1994. When we refer to Navtech, we are speaking of Navtech-US and its subsidiaries.
Our head office and principal operations are based at 295 Hagey Blvd., Suite 200, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, N2L 6R5. We maintain a website at www.navtechinc.com. Our common stock is publicly traded on the OTC Bulletin Board under the symbol “NAVH”. For investor information, we can be reached at (519) 747- 1170.
We develop, market, and support flight operations solutions for the commercial aviation industry.
Our systems are designed to assist commercial passenger and cargo air carriers in the dynamic
environment of their daily flight operations.
We believe that our success is generally attributable to four factors:
- we offer technology-based productivity solutions through our retention of a highly skilled and experienced technical and flight operations workforce that combines expert knowledge of both aviation and software development
- we employ a highly-regarded technical and operations support team that provides customer service on a round-the-clock basis
- we have a broad customer base that includes some of the most successful small, medium and large
airlines, and they consist of charter, cargo, and scheduled passenger carriers that operate in all
geographic regions of the world
- we have a reputation as an entrepreneurial organization capable of partnering and meeting the
ever-changing needs of our customers to allow them to effectively compete in their marketplace
Strategy
Our objective is to be the premiere provider of a complete and integrated operations management
system to the airlines in the world. To achieve this objective, our strategy consists of a concentrated
effort to build on our premiere dispatch and crew planning product line, acquire the operations
control, aircraft maintenance and ground operations components for our overall integrated
operations management system, and enter into strategic partnerships to fill out the remainder of
specialty applications that a given client may require as part of its product suite.
The flight operations industry has undergone significant changes in recent years with a number of
trends emerging that have had a significant impact on the marketplace. These trends have caused
convergence of flight operations management systems as it relates to airspace management and the
different functions required to efficiently manage airlines operations. The major trends are:
- Significant increases in input costs for labor, insurance and, most recently, security and fuel;
- Rationalization of routes by the major network carriers in response to the general economic conditions and the increased competition from low fare carriers;
- Strategic investments by airlines in the areas of operational planning, control, revenue and network management and customer loyalty;
- Alliances of major airlines and their associated regional carriers creating virtual buying groups and substantial new competitors in market segments in which the individual airlines were weak;
- Increased outsourcing of non-core business activities as a means of reducing costs; and
- An increase in collaborative decision making (CDM) between the different airspace users as a means of improving capacity and efficiency. This effort is to reduce the estimated worldwide cost of $2 billion annually that results from inefficient air traffic management systems.
The effects of convergence and the development of hardware technology, operating systems and
wireless technology should continue the trend toward the creation of a real-time integrated
operations control system wherein the air traffic control authorities, airline operations centers and
pilots all have the same information available to make decisions and can seamlessly communicate
and implement those decisions throughout their networks.
Airline passenger traffic during our last fiscal year has shown signs of recovery after the tragic events
of September 11, 2001 and the viral epidemic Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) early in
2003, which caused a sharp decline in Asia Pacific travel as well as a general decline in travel
worldwide. Although traffic has started to recover worldwide, in many regions such as North America
and Europe ticket prices and yields have remained depressed due to the continued penetration of
low cost carriers and the overcapacity of seats. Two U.S. major carriers, United Airlines (number two
worldwide in sales) and US Airways, as well as airlines such as American Trans Air, Volare, and
Southeast, are operating under bankruptcy protection.
Since 2001, airlines have reduced their capital expenditures, which has had a corresponding effect on
our market. This resulted in an increased length of sales cycle and a reduction of the resources that
prospective customers can apply to evaluating and improving internal systems. Finally, there have
been new entrants in most segments of the crew scheduling and dispatch markets during the last 12
months. These factors have combined to lead to an intensification among vendors that has led to
price declines in certain product-market segments.
The more recent recovery and industry restructuring among airlines in North America and Europe has
led to a significant increase in interest for certain products and services that we offer. As well, the
continuing deregulation of the airline industry in Asia (excluding China and Japan) is leading to a
record number of new start-up airlines, a phenomenon similar to the previous North American and
more recent European experience.
Trends in the airline industry have created a market for firms capable of creating a fully integrated
operations management system that interfaces well with legacy systems and performs all of the
following required functions in an integrated fashion:
- Dispatch
- Airline Schedule and Commercial Planning
- Crew Scheduling
- Maintenance
- Ground Operations
- Reservations
As with most mature industries, airlines typically had functional silos for the different parts of their
operation: crew, dispatch, maintenance, and passenger services/ground operations. In these
organizations, decision-making was inefficient due to a lack of information or the inability to handle
all of the information presented. The early 1990s saw the emergence of a systems operations control
(SOC) philosophy in which the various functional silos would report to a single manager for the
execution of the daily flight schedule. The implementation of the SOC philosophy has meant changes
in physical location, reporting lines, decision-making authority, business processes and technology.
Although the SOC philosophy was adopted in the large carrier segment (over 120 aircraft), especially
in North America and Western Europe, most mid-sized carriers have now moved to an integrated
operations control system as the next step in the development of their operational effectiveness.
Current Navtech Solutions
- DispatchProTM __ Provides real-time mission critical decision support to the
dispatcher or airline operations manager in the creation of a flight release and the subsequent
tracking and reporting of airline performance. The system has been created to bring together the
requirements of flight planning, weather, Notices to Airmen (NOTAMs), communications, flight
schedule maintenance, mapping, runway analysis, aviation communications, third-party integration
and management reporting. The software is designed to operate on the powerful, scalable, open
source LINUX operating system. DispatchProTM is currently used by customers in North America,
Europe, and the Asia-Pacific region.
- WebFPTM __ WebFPTM is an Internet-based, scaled-down version of DispatchProTM available to
airlines whose fleet size limits the requirement for the more sophisticated functionality of our high
end product or for those customers unable or unwilling to pay the higher costs involved with normal
communications methods.
- DispatchExpress TM __ Our newly released web-based crew briefing system.
With DispatchExpressTM airlines can streamline and standardize the process of providing necessary
flight paperwork to crew members, allow crew members to request up to the minute weather and
other operational updates, and reduce the costs typically associated with the distribution of this data
by by-passing proprietary third-party networks.
- V1PlusTM__ Our V1PlusTM service is an aircraft performance engineering subscription service that is
offered to airlines that do not maintain in-house engineering departments to provide regulatory
approved aircraft take-off and landing performance calculations. Our Aircraft Performance Systems
group prepares monthly manuals or CD-ROMs that provide customized updated take-off and landing
data specific to various aircraft/engine combinations, flap settings and runways for thousands of
airports around the world. V1PlusTM is also available in an onboard solution and as an integrated
module to DispatchProTM.
- C.G. ProTM__ Our aircraft weight and balance system, C.G. ProTM, incorporates aircraft first principles and technology to improve flight release processes and on-time effectiveness. The system
is available for use on a stand-alone basis or across a network, and in both wide and narrow body
aircraft, in passenger, freight or combination configurations.
- OperationsCentreTM__ Our OperationsCentreTM service provides outsourced dispatch and crew
management services to airlines around the world. Our capabilities include flight planning, overflight
and landing permits, slot control, ground handling, and flight following. This service is targeted at
small and start up carriers that may not be able to afford in-house dispatch or those that have
seasonal flight operations and do not want to deal with annual hiring, training and dismissing to meet
their changing requirements.
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CLASSTM__ CLASSTM, a preferential bidding system, allows the user to match available flying to an
individual crew member’s preferences in order to produce and optimize a final crew schedule that
respects contractual constraints and company operating requirements. Today, our customers’ pilots
and flight attendants use CLASSTM to bid their scheduling preferences globally via the Internet,
which makes the process of crew planning simple and efficient. The system is a true win-win for the
airline and its crew members and demonstrates extremely high overall crew satisfaction, and a
reduction in crew-related expenses and crew planner work.
- Cygnus™__ In August 2003, we acquired the source code rights to a premium crew pairing optimizer,
Cygnus™, in use by some of the world’s premiere airlines. A crew pairing optimizer is the primary tool
available to airlines and crew planners in minimizing crew costs and ensuring operational
effectiveness once the contract and marketing schedule are set. We have been successful with the
integration of this product into our sales processes and have made sales of this product to existing
and new Navtech customers during the 2004 fiscal year.
- CrewBid™__ CrewBid™ is our newly launched suite of applications for crew members to state or
bid for preferences for training, vacation assignments or trading of duties. Our system is accessible
worldwide via the Internet and greatly reduces the costs associated with gathering and sorting
through this information from crew members as there are, usually, contractual penalties for the
airline for improper processing. Crew members benefit through standardization of processes and
accessibility to features and functions associated with the work schedule that otherwise would not
be available through the use of manual systems.
Customer Support__ We offer comprehensive software support and customer account management in
the United States, Canada, Africa, Europe, and the Asia Pacific region designed to maximize the
benefits and utility of the software at the customer’s location. These services include training and
installation support, software updates, including new system functionality and ongoing
enhancements, and telephone hot-line support. We believe that quality support services are a
critical component of the customer’s satisfaction level. Our customer support services are provided
at our two operations centers in Waterloo, Canada and Crawley (Gatwick), United Kingdom.
Custom Programming Services__Design and programming services are provided to customers that
require specific custom solutions to their flight operations requirements. We believe that there is an
increased demand in the commercial aviation market for systems integration services that link our
software to third party vendor applications. We also provide consulting services to assist customers in
optimizing the use of the product functionality within their flight operations process.
Our primary focus is on air carriers that operator modern aircraft with fleet sizes greater than 5
aircraft. Our primary geographical markets are North America, Europe, and the Asia Pacific region;
these segments of the airline market are more progressive with respect to information technology,
outsourcing and cost reduction.
We currently have a broad customer base of 120 airlines worldwide. In North America we have 81
customers using our products and services, and includes approximately 33% of all long-haul carriers.
Our European market has been one of development over the last several years and this market has
been our largest segment of growth for our dispatch systems over the last two years. At the end of
fiscal 2004, we had 36 airlines based in Europe, Africa and the Middle East using our products and
services. In Asia Pacific, a market of focus for the last year, we now have five customers and our
initial reference customer for our core DispatchProTM system is currently completing installation. No
customer represented in excess of 10% of our total revenues for the last fiscal year.
Over the past three years, Navtech invested heavily in the development of our crew planning
business line as part of our overall strategy of providing an integrated operations management
system to the airlines of the world. During the past fiscal year, we were able to generate significant
interest in our crew planning products and, as a result, we grew from a client base of only two
airlines to nine different operators already using our systems or presently being installed as of the
end of fiscal 2004.
The market for the integrated operations control systems is intensely competitive and subject to
rapid change. We expect competition to increase in the future as new market entrants and products
come to market and consolidation of vendors continues. We believe that the principal competitive
factors include product functionality, total cost of solution, support infrastructure, and underlying
technology.
Our main competitors can be divided into three main categories:
- Major airline information technology spin-offs such as Lufthansa’s Information Technology Software
GmbH (Lufthansa Systems), The Sabre Group (a former subsidiary of American Airlines), and EDS;
- Aviation software vendors such as Jeppesen and SBS International (both acquired by Boeing),
Honeywell, SITA (the European aviation network provider) and ARINC (the American aviation network
provider); and
- Smaller independent companies with annual revenue of less than $20 million that have developed
flight operations management solutions for commercial aviation, such as AIMS, Carmen Systems, Air
Data, European Aeronautical Group (EAG), AD Opt Technologies, FWZ, and AOS
We believe that the larger corporations such as Boeing, Lufthansa, EDS, Honeywell, SITA and ARINC
have an interest in being the driving forces behind not only the infrastructure development (e.g.,
onboard systems, moving map technology, ground to air communications, air traffic management
system improvements) but also the service delivery (e.g. outsourcing of air traffic management
responsibilities). We believe that these companies will continue to be at the forefront of the industry
consolidation.
In fiscal 2004, the following three significant developments occurred:
- the acquisition of Ad Opt Technologies by Kronos;
- the acquisition of RM Rocade by Sabre; and
- the acquisition of Caleb Technologies by Navitaire
We employ a direct sales force to market our products and services in North America, Europe, and
the Asia Pacific region through offices in Canada and the United Kingdom and the retention of sales
professionals in Sweden and Singapore. In addition, we employ an account management team that
provides customer and sales support and sells add-on services to existing customers. The
development of this team in fiscal 2004 will continue to enhance our ability to distribute new
products currently in development to new and existing customers, expand our customer base into
new geographies, and target different types and sizes of air carriers. We have chosen to use direct
sales as our only means of distribution since i) the nature of our sales transactions are typically
represent smaller recurring revenue streams; ii) the number of potential customers is small; and iii)
the markets that we are currently accessing are modern industrial nations. The sales approach is
revisited periodically and distribution partners may be secured if appropriate.
Most of our software products are developed internally. We also purchase technology and license
intellectual property rights. During the last two fiscal years, we have been advancing and developing
our next generation architecture and product line. We also have established development
methodologies and procedures that provide structure to our product development activities and
allow us to track the efforts of the Product Development group. This is especially important given
Navtech-Canada’s access to tax credits for qualifying research and development.
We communicate with our customers through account managers and user group meetings to
determine the latest requirements of the operations department of an airline. The product
management function within our business coordinates requirements and manages the life-cycle and
positioning of our products.
During fiscal 2004 and 2003, we spent approximately $817,000 and $455,000, respectively, on
product research and development activities. These amounts represented approximately 10% and 7%,
respectively, of revenue in each of those years. We are committed to continue our expenditures on
research and product development.
You can email us with comments, questions, or specific requests for information, and you can also
sign up to receive an email alert when key investor news and financial releases are published.
Investor Relations Contacts
Gord Kilpatrick, CFO
+1 (519) 747 1170 Ext. 288
ir@navtechinc.com
http://www.navtechinc.com
295 Hagey Blvd. Suite 200
Waterloo, Ontario, N2L 6R5
TEL: +1 (519) 747 1170
FAX: +1 (519) 747 1003
ARINC: YKFNSCR
SITA: YYZNSCR
Shareholder Contact
Continental Stock Transfer & Trust Company
http://www.continentalstock.com/
212.509.4000 ext. 206,
cstmail@continentalstock.com
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