Air Canada Taking Care Of Its Employees

Air Canada said it plans to explore the application of COVID-19 contact tracing technology in its workplace using the Bluetooth enabled TraceSCAN app and wearable technology developed by Canadian-based Facedrive Inc.

Samuel Elfassy, vice president, safety at Air Canada, said: “The health and safety of our employees is of paramount concern to Air Canada and is key to restoring our operations safely for our customers. Air Canada has embraced a science-based approach to managing COVID-19 and as part of this has committed to evaluate the use of new technologies like TraceSCAN’s wearables. We are enthusiastic about exploring the use of TraceSCAN because this Canadian technology has the potential to provide another layer of safety for our employees, so they can focus on taking care of our customers.”

Sayan Navaratnam, chairman and chief executive officer at Facedrive Inc., said that: “Our project with Air Canada is ground-breaking and provides another critical example of how TraceSCAN supplements the capability of the Canadian government-sponsored COVID Alert App. TraceSCAN will allow Air Canada to provide further protection to their employees, especially as many of these employees work in environments where the use of cell phone technology is not possible.”

And he continued: “We are very pleased to help Air Canada explore ways to provide additional protection to their employees. We hope this pilot will be a model for other airlines to follow and look forward to continuing to work with industry to protect Canadians as our country returns to its normal working and travel schedules.”

The technology behind TraceSCAN was developed in partnership with leading minds at the University of Waterloo.

“TraceSCAN is an AI-powered solution for contact tracing in the workplace which can track staff exposure to COVID-19 without GPS information. The technology provides a risk-based assessment of an individual’s exposure within dynamic and dense work environments. The technology enables the creation and management of safer work environments needed during this critical phase of the pandemic,” said William Melek, University of Waterloo mechanical and mechatronics engineering professor.