The 1st Manufacturing World Nagoya (sponsored by Reed Exhibitions Japan Ltd.) was held in Port Messe Nagoya from April 19 to 21. On the first day Nobuo Kishi vice president and chief engineer of Mitsubishi Aircraft Corporation made a speech titled “Development and Future Overview of Japan’s first civil aviation Mitsubishi Regional Jet (MRJ)”. Mr. Kishi said, “Mitsubishi Heavy Industries had been manufacturing aircrafts related to Ministry of Defense under license and working as a subcontractor for Boeing 767 and 777, and is now being engaged in the production of MRJ integrating these technologies and know-how. On November 11 last year we succeeded in the trial flight, and we plan to start our mass production line by the coming summer.” 　

For your information, Mitsubishi Aircraft Corporation headquartered in Nagoya Airport is a developer and producer of MRJ owned 64% by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, 10% by Mitsubishi Corporation, 10% by Toyota Motor and others, having two plants in Tobishima and Ohe. The business scale of Japanese civil aircrafts is just 1.7 trillion yen which is equivalent to one thirtieths of the world accounting for 52 trillion yen including the U.S.A. and France. However, it seems that there will be a brisk demand of aircrafts with the background of globalization and the economic growth of the developing countries. Above all, much expectation is placed on the market of the 50 to 100 seating regional jets which fly short inter-city distances.

At present, Bombardier Inc. (Canada) and Embraer (Brazil) are two strong players in the RJ market where ARJ (China) and Sukhoi Superjet (Russia) are also participating. Later started MRJ shows the features of environmental properties like low fuel consumption, low noise, less CO2 emission as well as the maneuverability and comfortability of passengers.

Thanks to the features highly evaluated despite the stage just after the successful initial flight, orders have already been placed for 427 MRJs by ANA, JAL, SkyWest Airlines and Aerolease Aviation. Flight demonstration tests will be implemented this summer in Moses Lake, Washington to obtain an Airworthiness Certificate, so that a production capacity of 10 aircrafts per month can be developed as planned.