Major contract puts Rigstar in expansion mode
Company to provide telecommunications services to Coastal Gas Pipeline
It’s a pleasure to report that a Calgary company has leased space in a downtown office tower, and is in expansion mode thanks largely to being awarded a major contract with a pipeline.
Rigstar Communications has a 6,000-square-foot office and yard in Exploration Park, but president and CEO Dan Grisdale felt the need to have an office presence downtown and called on his commercial realtor, Chris Howard of Avison Young, for advice.
Rigstar has consequently added to its real estate by leasing 9,000 square feet of space on the 22nd floor of the Shell Centre on 4th Avenue S.W., although it already has a downtown presence with its state-of-the-art Data Centre connected to the largest global IP network, ensuring “mission critical” data is available at all times.
Operating as Rigstar Industrial Telecom, the company is a privately held Canadian entity founded and based in Calgary that delivers full life-cycle communications services to organizations with expansive and remote network requirements across Canada and the U.S.
A Non-Dominant Carrier with the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, it has been designing, installing and supporting strategic pervasive communication platforms both remotely and in urban environments for more than 20 years.
Founded in 1998 with the introduction of a wired intercom system to the energy sector, the owners recognized the need for cellular enhancement to remote locations. Since then, it has grown to offer accelerated internet connectivity, fibre optics, tower construction, cellular enhancement and network support.
It has been awarded many telecommunication infrastructure projects and was recently selected by Coastal Gas Pipeline as its telecommunications services provider.
Rigstar’s contract will support 10 camps and associated offices along the 670-kilometre pipeline stretching from near Dawson Creek, B.C., to the proposed LNG Canada facility near Kitimat, B.C.
Grisdale says his company has spent the past four years engineering and designing a unique and complex remote telecom network solution that will support more than 20,000 workers over a three-year period.
“To further enhance our commitment to the region and ensure the overall success of the project, Rigstar intends to open a number of remote field offices along the route, including its principal service centre in Prince George,” he says.
The network will require eight repeaters to service the camps — four on a mountain top that will require a helicopter lift, and the other four accessible by existing logging roads and trails. In place they will use a broadband pipeline to help provide the camps with internet, television, photocopiers, telephones and other services.
Grisdale says his staff have spent a lot of time meeting with local communities and are pleased with the business opportunities the project will provide for Indigenous people.
The new downtown office space will become Rigstar’s Network Operations Centre, which will require the hiring of more
engineers and solutions specialists, adding to the 30 staff in Calgary. Recently appointed to the role of COO is Coralee Mazurek, who was recruited from a leading national ISP communications company.
Rigstar also has a busy U.S. office based in Houston that within 18 months of operations has completed projects in 30 states.