BBC World
The biggest potential threat to the dominance of Western aircraft makers has been unveiled at the Singapore Air Show.
China's answer to Boeing and Airbus is showing a slender, blue-and-white model of the Comac C919 aircraft for the first time outside the mainland. Its introduction was low-key, a move consistent with how Chinese firms prefer to operate overseas.
The aircraft, designed and built entirely in China, will compete directly against industry stalwarts A320 and Boeing 737 after completing flight trials in four years. It should be available commercially by 2016.
"That's our plan," an official from the Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China, or Comac, tells BBC News.
"But it will be tough to stick to it. These days, delivery dates are often pushed back."
Next year delivery
The C919 is part of China's stated goal of developing a homegrown aerospace industry, which may someday challenge Airbus and Boeing's hold on the global market for commercial aviation.
Comac is likely to build more than 2,000 C919s in the next two decades, with a view to grab a 10% share of the global market for narrow body aircraft.
It has been a meteoric rise for Comac, established just a year and a half ago.
Headquartered in Shanghai, the company is fully backed by the central government, as well as by the local government and a number of state-owned firms such as Chinalco and Baosteel.
Comac has already sold more than 240 of its ARJ-21 twin-engine regional jets to Chinese airlines, as well as to a Laotian carrier and to a unit of General Electric. The plane is scheduled for delivery to customers next year.
The biggest potential threat to the dominance of Western aircraft makers has been unveiled at the Singapore Air Show.
China's answer to Boeing and Airbus is showing a slender, blue-and-white model of the Comac C919 aircraft for the first time outside the mainland. Its introduction was low-key, a move consistent with how Chinese firms prefer to operate overseas.
The aircraft, designed and built entirely in China, will compete directly against industry stalwarts A320 and Boeing 737 after completing flight trials in four years. It should be available commercially by 2016.
"That's our plan," an official from the Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China, or Comac, tells BBC News.
"But it will be tough to stick to it. These days, delivery dates are often pushed back."
Next year delivery
The C919 is part of China's stated goal of developing a homegrown aerospace industry, which may someday challenge Airbus and Boeing's hold on the global market for commercial aviation.
Comac is likely to build more than 2,000 C919s in the next two decades, with a view to grab a 10% share of the global market for narrow body aircraft.
It has been a meteoric rise for Comac, established just a year and a half ago.
Headquartered in Shanghai, the company is fully backed by the central government, as well as by the local government and a number of state-owned firms such as Chinalco and Baosteel.
Comac has already sold more than 240 of its ARJ-21 twin-engine regional jets to Chinese airlines, as well as to a Laotian carrier and to a unit of General Electric. The plane is scheduled for delivery to customers next year.