Jeff Buckstein,
Ottawa Citizen;
June 23, 2009
A track record of innovation and technological success, combined with the determination to adhere to a strategic plan developed earlier this decade, has helped Ottawa's Neptec Design Group Ltd. continue to thrive in hard economic times.
"We made a decision about eight years ago to diversify," says Neptec president Iain Christie. "At that time we were deriving 85 or 90 per cent of our revenue directly from National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) contracts. It was clear that was not the right way to run a company if we wanted to stay in business for a long time.
"That diversification has really started to take hold in the last year."
Neptec has remained profitable despite the recession. In fact, growth through the third quarter of fiscal 2009 is up an estimated 20 per cent over the same period last year, says Christie. The company has 92 employees, up from 80 about one year ago, with new positions filled in a variety of specialty areas, including software, systems engineers and analysts, electrical engineers, mechanical engineers and quality control.
Neptec is one of several companies in Ottawa that have been able to expand over the last year, says Claude Haw, president and chief executive officer of the Ottawa Centre for Research and Innovation.
"It speaks to their ability to deliver a very innovative and cost-effective, targeted solution to meet certain needs. By being highly competitive, they've been able to continue to grow, and more opportunities are within their grasp."
While the recession has had a negative effect on many private sector industries, about 95 per cent of Neptec's revenues are derived from public sector applications, including the military.
NASA, for which Neptec has been a prime contractor since 1995, remains a major client. Neptec provides NASA with an advanced space vision system used during construction of the International Space Station, and a laser camera system used to inspect the space shuttle's underbelly and wing for damaged tiles while in orbit to help assure a safe re-entry.
"NASA taught us to be innovative and find new ways to solve problems -- and to deploy those solutions in ways that are really reliable. We're finding that approach has a market in any economic situation," says Christie.
Recently, Neptec signed three contracts with the Canadian Space Agency worth $1.6 million to provide concepts for a new lunar rover with resource extraction capability to be used when manned flights return to the moon.
Other technology developed and promoted by Neptec includes the TriDAR 3-D vision system, a multi-purpose scanner that will be flying on the space shuttle Atlantis in August when it is tested as an automated rendezvous and docking sensor between the shuttle and the space station.
Neptec's obscurant-penetrating autosynchronous lidar product, known by the acronym OPAL, creates a real-time image of an area obscured by factors such as whiteouts, fog, or dust clouds. OPAL was developed in partnership with CAE Inc. to help pilots penetrate through poor visual environments.
"The idea of the sensor is that since it will see through the dust or snow you can replace the pilot's vision with synthetic vision, which allows them to land the aircraft," explains Christie.
Neptec's electrical impedance tomography software is used for anti-mine work, particularly in wet soil or coastal ocean areas where "you need a fairly conductive environment" to find buried mine-like objects or unexploded ordinances. "It basically forms an underground map (to) find objects of different electrical impedance," says Christie.
The company's laser metrology system is designed to help clients in the industrial automation market, in industries such as aviation, automotive or sheet metal, make precise direct point measurements.
The recession has led to delays in industrial projects, although that constitutes a small segment of Neptec's business.
"We were expecting a bit more growth this year than we're actually seeing" on the industrial side of the business, says Christie, who is optimistic all the same that there will be post-recession benefits.
Neptec is also looking to expand its international presence, as nearly all its revenues are currently generated within North America.
"We're embarking on a 'going global' initiative to strengthen our business in the U.S. and Canada, and look at some foreign markets," says Jason Di Tommaso, Neptec's vice-president of global marketing and strategic development.
Larger industries that have survived the tough times will be looking for new and innovative technologies in order to grab an edge on their competition, he says.
"We're hopeful that a lot of the technology we have will find a home in the industrial sector when business starts to improve (and) people are really interested in taking it up a notch."