CAE Australia - a major industry asset

Like the SimTecT event, CAE Australia recently celebrated its 10th birthday as a power in Australia's simulation industry.
Established as an Australian corporate entity for the past 10 years, CAE, the world's leading producer of simulators for commercial and military aircraft, and the second largest training organisation, has nevertheless been successfully involved in Australian civil and military programs for more than 30 years.

With major Australian defence programs in prospect and defence industry policy focussing on the development of indigenous capabilities, CAE Australia was established locally with the acquisition of Ferranti. Currently employing some 80 personnel CAE Australia now boasts annual revenues exceeding $20 million.

And having outgrown its Sydney offices, the company last year moved to new larger premises at Slough Business Park, Silverwater. There, Defence Minister Robert Hill opened the new facilities in what was also a celebration of the company's tenth anniversary in this country.

Recent program success has included the RAAF Airlift Program which required CAE to design, develop, and manufacture three Full Flight Simulators - B707, C-130J, and C-130H. Each of these devices encompassed a full size replica of the flight deck, a five-channel CAE visual system, 6-DOF motion system, and on-board forward-facing instructor operator station. CAE's Military Simulation and Training operation in Australia is responsible for customer training and on-site turnkey support at RAAF Base Richmond.

CAE also designed and delivered a C-130J Systems Familiarisation Trainer (SFT) used by the RAAF for classroom training of aircrew and ground maintenance personnel in systems familiarisation, normal operation, malfunction identification and troubleshooting.

The S-70A Blackhawk full flight and mission simulator, delivered with an integrated facility to the Army Aviation Centre at Oakey, was the first military helicopter simulator to earn the Australian Civil Aviation Safety Authority's Level 5 accreditation, equivalent to the FAA Level D.

The operation, maintenance and engineering services for all these simulators at Richmond, Oakey, and the S-70B-2 Seahawk simulator at Nowra, are bundled under an omnibus service contract known as the Management Support for ADF Aerospace Simulators (MSAAS). This contract is based on a 10-year strategic partnership with the Defence Materiel Organisation, at a contract value baselined at $10 million/year.

Recent work under this contract has included upgrades to both the C-130 simulators, a visual upgrade based on the CAE Medallion-S product for the Seahawk simulator, and the Black Hawk and Seahawk SAMTGENX Simfinity devices (virtual maintenance trainers).

In the Civil domain, CAE owns and operates a Dash-8 simulator located at Qantas (Mascot) and the company was selected by Qantas last year to source and support their simulator for the Airbus 380. CAE was also selected to supply a Lear 45 simulator to Singapore Airlines for their training centre at Maroochydore, Qld. CAE also supports new installations, provides technical services and visual and other technical upgrades for legacy equipment in Australia and the region.

Through ready access to CAE's worldwide expertise in simulation, modelling, training and technical support, CAE Australia is expanding its own offerings and growing an ever-stronger domestic capability within the Australian organisation.

Examples of this growth include Modelling and Simulation (M&S) technology delivery for analysis and experimentation to the Boeing Systems Analysis Laboratory (SAL), and the initiation of the CAE Consulting Services Group, with Defence's Rapid Prototyping Development and Evaluation (RPDE) program as one of the anticipated customers.

CAE Australia has come a long way in its first ten years in the country and, in embracing an Australian persona, shaped more towards serving Defence's capability goals, rather than the market thrust of its parent, we are seeing in this and other advanced defence companies, the birth of important industry 'enablers' providing Defence with the functional capabilities required for modern warfighting.

By Tom Muir, Canberra