AirAsia Japan (Nagoya Chubu) has commenced certification with the Japan Civil Aeronautics Board (JCAB) ahead of a planned launch in Spring 2016. Quoting local media sources, the ZipanguFlyer blog reports that despite delays brought on by a revision of its business plan, the LCC could secure its Air Operator Certificate (AOC) as early as October of this year.

A joint venture between AirAsia Group (49%), Octave Japan Infrastructure Fund (19%), Rakuten (18%), Noevir Holdings (9%), and Alpen (5%), AirAsia Japan will offer budget flights from its Nagoya hub to Fukuoka, Sapporo Chitose, and Seoul Incheon initially adding Sendai and Taipei Taoyuan thereafter.

The start-up will take delivery of its first of ten A320-200 (sl)s on order from Airbus (AIB, Toulouse Blagnac) later this month - JA01DJ (cn 6676) - with the second - JA02DJ - due in August. By the end of 2016, the LCC plans to operate a fleet of six A320-200s adding five each year through 2018 when it expects to operate a total of sixteen twinjets.

This is AirAsia's second attempt at the Japanese market. The first version of AirAsia Japan - a partnership with ANA - All Nippon Airways (NH, Tokyo Haneda) parent ANA Holdings - ended in June 2013 following a dispute over managerial styles. ANA subsequently used the remains of the partnership to form its own budget operation - Vanilla Air (Tokyo Narita).