Grupo Viva, the Latin American airline holding firm which co-owns Mexico's VivaAerobus (VB, Monterrey Mariano Escobedo) and Colombia's VivaColombia (Medellín José Maria Córdova), has shelved plans to establish a new Central American LCC unit in Costa Rica in favour of a new, yet-to-be-disclosed location.

The group's tight-lipped Chief Executive Officer Joe Mohan told Routes Online that the new carrier will commence operations during the third quarter of the year using leased A320 aircraft.

On why the group had decided to drop its VivaLatinoamérica (San José Juan Santamaría), formerly known as VivaCam (San José Juan Santamaría), project for the time being, Mohan said that Central American market conditions coupled with further analysis had diluted its interest.

“Although the Central American market is the same size of Colombia, where we already have an effective Viva operation, it is split between seven smaller country markets and the current supply of seats has not grown over the past ten years. There are also significant tax and airport fee constraints that mean we couldn’t achieve the price points we require to stimulate the market effectively,” he said.

Of recent, Grupo Viva's constituent shareholder Irelandia Aviation has been linked to a possible LCC venture in Chile with talks having reportedly taken place with Santiago de Chile airport operator, Grupo Nuevo Pudahuel.

The Irish firm did not respond for comment at the time of going to press.