A meeting between the Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister Tran Hong Ha and the Deputy Secretary of COMAC (Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China) Tan Wangeng has raised the possibility of Chinese-made aircraft operating in Vietnam.
The two sides met on January 15, 2025, to discuss the prospect of COMACs C909 and C919 model flying to Vietnam in the not-too-distant future.
According to Reuters, following the meeting the Vietnam government said it would look at removing regulatory barriers that currently restrict COMAC-made planes arriving in the country.
A China Eastern Airlines C919 recently landed at Hong Kong International Airport (HKG) as part of a new daily service from Shanghai, but up until then COMAC-made aircraft have only operated in China.
If COMAC is to truly compete with the Airbus-Boeing duopoly then its aircraft will need to be certified in additional regulatory regions such as the European Union and the United States.
However, even with a much smaller aviation authority in somewhere like Vietnam there will still be many regulatory obstacles for COMAC to overcome.
Reuters also reported that during the meeting, VietJet emerged as an airline that could work with Chinese airline already operating COMAC jets to test the aircraft.
In December 2024, VietJet signed a lease contract for two C909 aircraft beginning in 2025, according to local media reports.
COMAC has also been looking to attract airlines based in Indonesia, Cambodia, and Kazakhstan, to place orders for its C919 plane.
Target airlines are said to include Garuda Indonesia, which is said to be in the market for as many as 70 new single-aisle aircraft
