Canadian engineering company Flying Colours is beefing up its completions and refurbishment portfolio to include bespoke special mission projects for Bombardier’s Global family of high-end business jets.
Flying Colours says the move has been driven by “customer demand”, adding that it now has the capacity to take on new projects with the completion of the first part of a three-phase expansion programme at its Peterborough, Ontario base.
The privately-owned company made a foray into the special missions market last year with a contract from Bombardier for seven CRJ700s for an unnamed Chinese client. Five of these regional airliners have been delivered and the remaining aircraft will be handed over at the end of the year.
Flying Colours has already received supplemental type certification for a number of customised interiors for the Global airframe, targeted at surveillance, VIP/medical evacuation and air ambulance operators. These interiors will be offered from the end of next year, the company says.
The company has been in operation for more than 25 years performing VIP completions and refurbishment on a host of business aircraft, from Beechcraft King Air twin-engined turboprops to the Challenger 850s – for which it is the exclusive completions provider.
“We’ve been focused on the ‘pretty stuff’ with our ongoing completions,” says Flying Colours executive vice president Sean Gillespie. “But the defence market is something that we’ve been trying to tap in to for a while. The long-term goal is to be able to do the whole missionised project, and we’ll grow into it.”
Source: Flight International
