Tour Tech East may file for bankruptcy; jobs at risk
The Business Development Bank of Canada now owns the Tour Tech building in Burnside
Tour Tech East faces an uncertain future after the Nova Scotia company took several blows recently.
The Tour Tech East building in Burnside now belongs to the Business Development Bank of Canada. The company owes the bank $4.7 million, and Tuesday, it called its security.
"This is a bank that's supposed to help Atlantic Canadians and help develop business. It comes to this at a time when the economy is tough and everyone is willing to step up and support this — and then to have a bank decide they don't want to be in on it and they're fully secured on all of their investment, 100 per cent fully secured? This isn't right," said Peter Hendrickson, president and CEO of Tour Tech East Limited.
Hendrickson said the company has been going through a rough patch and has been trying to avoid filing for bankruptcy.
Part of that plan included creditors agreeing to take a loss, employees taking a pay cut and private investors willing to put in $1.3 million. Hendrickson says all creditors, except the Business Development Bank of Canada, were on board with the plan.
"The BDC turned this down and in effect killed 30 jobs."
Tour Tech is known for providing sound and lighting equipment to big acts passing through Atlantic Canada, including most recently, Journey. With fewer mega concerts on the go, the company has been going through a rough patch, including a roof collapse at their headquarters this past winter.
"Our intent was to work on ACDC coming up, the Dutch Mason Blues Festival this weekend coming up, all these events after this are all affected, the Canadian Country Music Awards. We're employing local people to do all of this work," said Hendrickson.
A spokesperson for the Business Development Bank of Canada told CBC Tour Tech East failed to show how the company would be profitable going forward, but Henderickson disputes this. He said that information was sent to the bank via Deloitte weeks ago.
Hendrickson is still trying to find ways to keep Tour Tech East in operation, including trying to find investors that could buy out the Business Development Bank of Canada.