Thank you, Mr. Chair, members of the committee.
It's a pleasure to be here to discuss rail transportation technologies with you.
Thank you for inviting Bombardier. It's a pleasure to be here with you this morning to share our perspectives and views on rail technologies and innovation. I will make a few introductory comments before passing the torch to my colleague, Mr. Paul Larouche.
I'll give you an overview of Bombardier Transportation. As you know, we have two large business units, aerospace and transportation. I guess rail transportation here in Canada may be the lesser known side of our operations, despite the fact that we are the number one rail equipment manufacturer in the world.
Bombardier Transportation has 62 production and engineering sites in 25 countries and a workforce of 36,200 employees. We have customers and services in more than 60 countries. We are the only global rail manufacturer with a strong important presence here in Canada, with a workforce of more than 3,000 highly qualified employees. We have two manufacturing sites, one in La Pocatière, in the province of Quebec, and one in Thunder Bay, in the province of Ontario. We have major engineering sites in Saint-Bruno and also in Kingston. We also have a service centre, serving customers across North America in Mississauga. Our headquarters for Bombardier Transportation North America, which also includes facilities in the United States and Mexico, is located in Saint-Bruno, in Quebec.
I want to underline that the company overall, rail transit and aerospace inclusive, is currently going through a very intense period of research and development, probably unprecedented in our history for its intensity and scale. Over the last five years we have invested more than $2.7 billion in our Canadian operations, including plants, property equipment, tooling, intangible assets, and R and D as well. For instance, on the rail side, we have nearly doubled our workforce in Kingston in the last few years, and we have established a new engineering centre in Saint-Bruno, Quebec.
I will now turn things over to my colleague Mr. Larouche.