Our story began more than sixty years ago, when Spitfire combat pilot Paul-Émile Lapointe returned from flying 211 combat missions over the skies of North Africa and Europe in World War II, with the dream of founding an airline that would link small, remote communities along Canada’s eastern coast, stretching from Gaspé in the province of Quebec through Labrador to Hudson’s Bay in the far north.

With backing from local businesses in the small Quebec city of Rimouski, Lapointe began operations with a single war-surplus two-seat Fleet Canuck, then quickly added Beech 18s, DC-3s and DC-4s. By the mid-1950s, his airline, Quebecair, had emerged as a dominant player in the Canadian aviation industry, with a reputation for its entrepreneurial spirit, aggressive growth and customer service – values that continue in ExelTech today.

Quebecair’s Montreal-based maintenance and engineering group won its own reputation for innovation and high productivity as the airline pioneered the operation of turboprop aircraft (Convair 540) and small jets (BAC 1-11). In the 1980s, after the company was acquired by a major Canadian international air carrier and re-named Inter Canadian Airlines, it became the North American launch customer for the Fokker F.100 regional jet and a lead operator of the ATR 42 turboprop, going on to establish utilization and maintenance reliability records.

ExelTech Aerospace emerged as a new standalone MRO company in a management buyout in April 2000 of Inter Canadian’s maintenance and engineering operations. Focusing initially on ATR 42 maintenance, ExelTech has grown rapidly, expanding its support services to encompass a wide range of regional jets and turboprops, and narrow-body aircraft. The company added an additional maintenance facility in Montreal in 2003 and merged with Quebec City-based NordTech in 2005.

In the summer of 2008, ExelTech opened a purpose-built 150,000 square feet state-of-the-art maintenance facility at Montreal's Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport where the Embraer E-Jet family is serviced. It also converted a former heavy maintenance facility into a dedicated line maintenance facility servicing domestic and international customers for Montreal's Trudeau Airport.

Today, ExelTech Aerospace is a major supplier of MRO services to the commercial airline industry, with more than 450 employees. With 255,000 square feet of hangar, shop and office space in three facilities at Montreal and Quebec city, ExelTech provides maintenance repair and overhaul services to a very diversified customer base that spans 25 countries on five continents.