Mitsubishi Working On Passenger Jet

The Wall Street Journal reports that Mitsubishi is trying to break into the passenger jet market:

According to people familiar with the situation, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. could announce as soon as Friday that it plans to move forward with its Mitsubishi Regional Jet, a 96-seat, single-aisle plane that it expects to enter service in 2012. The jet will harness new engine technology and construction methods that the company hopes will enable it to leapfrog existing regional jets in a crowded market.

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The Mitsubishi Regional Jet would be the result of almost 30 years of stop-and-go efforts. For years, Japanese executives have dreamed of using their vaunted automobile manufacturing techniques to produce aircraft, only to watch as Boeing and European Aeronautic Defence & Space Co. unit Airbus used many of those methods first.

So-called regional jets are smaller commercial planes with a range of around 2,000 miles aimed at medium-size markets. By choosing to start with a smaller jet, Japan will stay out of the competitive sights of Boeing and Airbus for now, but it will enter a market that is already crowded with established players such as Canada’s Bombardier Inc. and Brazil’s Empresa Brasileira de Aeronautica SA. In addition, both Russia and China are well on their way toward developing their own regional-jet programs. Like Japan, these countries plan to sell their jets abroad.

In recent years, airlines rushed to buy smaller regional jets, often with around 70 seats. As fuel prices have climbed, a number of operators have turned to more fuel-efficient turboprop planes. But many in the industry believe planes with around 100 seats, like the Mitsubishi jet, could fill an important niche.

Mitsubishi plans on using newly-developed Pratt & Whitney Geared Turbofan engines in the plane, which are supposedly 10% to 15% more fuel efficient than the engines currently used on regional jets.