President and CEO of Innovaat International, Mr. Dueck grew up on his father Willie’s farm north of Arborg. Attracted to the challenges of running a business, Raymond joined his father and brother in 1971 to start the Dueck Builder Mart lumberyard venture. As President of the company, he saw the company grow into one of the largest rural lumberyard in Manitoba. They built more than 800 homes and commercial buildings in 20 years.
In 1985, Mr. Dueck established ProfitMaster Computer Systems Canada Inc., designing and installing retail Point Of Sale (POS) systems for lumber yards and hardware stores. By ’95 ProfitMaster system installations rang up more than a half billion dollars in sales across Canada annually. Now located in UofM’s Innovation Park, the company is still going strong.
When Mr. Dueck joined Vidir Machine Inc as co-President in ‘95, the company had 16 employees. By 2008 the company had 2 manufacturing plants with more than 150 employees. Raymond and his partners managed phenomenal growth. For four years in a row, the company made Profit Magazine’s Fastest Growing Companies list.
The Vidir Group manufactured a range of products from carpet carousels for Home Depot to Bike Merchandizing Systems for Walmart, Motorized Moveable Bases for warehouse racking, carpet cutting machines, hopper bottom grain bins, and biomass fired greenhouse gas displacement systems.
In his role in Marketing and Product Development, Mr. Dueck designed and commercialized dozens of products, covered by a wide range of patents. His inventions have revolutionized his customers’ operations.
In 2008, he established Innovaat International Inc to develop and manufacture biomass thermal conversion systems. These systems are CO2 neutral with zero GHG (green house gas) environmental pollution.
In 2009 he led the group that purchased the million sq ft building from the Imperial Tobacco company and converted the tobacco processing plant in Aylmer Ontario to ElginInnovation.ca, a business incubator. It now houses 34 small companies that provide employment to 375 people.
One of his more recent inventions is the patented ZephyrBus GRT / StratoCar PRT mass transportation system that will save cities millions and would benefit a city on many ways. www.ZephyrBus.com
Always the inventor, Mr. Dueck, now semi-retired, recently turned to designing a very cost effective housing option using re-purposed sea-shipping containers to create safe, comfortable, and secure alternative housing for the under-privileged in our society. A 5 story containerized housing complex can accommodate as many as 150 living spaces on a 50′ x 150′ lot. When paired with a biomass thermal conversion system and an Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) electric generator the combined heat and power (CHP), this project could become the most environmentally friendly zero carbon emission housing option anywhere.