AirAsia Japan (Nagoya Chubu) has secured its Air Operators Certificate (AOC) from the Japan Civil Aviation Bureau division of the Japanese Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLITT) ahead of its planned launch early next year.
The start-up said in a statement that it would commence operations in Spring 2016 with flights from its Nagoya Chubu base to Sapporo Chitose, Sendai, and Taipei Taoyuan in Taiwan.
“We are very excited to be back in Japan. We have fantastic partners here and we are united in the vision to change the way people travel in Japan," AirAsia Group CEO Tony Fernandes said. "Centrair Airport is a fantastic base and with our new routes, we look forward not only to enable the Japanese to enjoy our direct destinations but to connect them to the rest of Asia and beyond on our extensive network.”
Operations are on-board a fleet of A320-200 (sl)s of which ten have been ordered from Airbus (AIB, Toulouse Blagnac).
AirAsia Japan is a joint venture between AirAsia Group (49%), Octave Japan Infrastructure Fund (19%), Rakuten (18%), Noevir Holdings (9%), and Alpen (5%).
The original AirAsia Japan, a 49/51 joint venture between the Malaysian LCC and ANA - All Nippon Airways (NH, Tokyo Haneda), collapsed in June 2013 when the Japanese carrier acquired AirAsia's shareholding and proceeded to establish its own wholly-owned venture, Vanilla Air (Tokyo Narita). Differences in management style among other issues were blamed for its demise.
