October has been a month of mixed fortunes for Chinese manufacturer Comac, as it looks to expand its presence beyond the borders of its home country. In good news, the Asian planemaker has confirmed that it will be present at the 2025 Dubai Airshow next month, which will represent the first time that it has appeared at the Middle Eastern event. It will send multiple planes and even be in the flying display.
However, elsewhere, its fortunes outside of China have taken a hit in recent days with the news that VietJet Air will no longer be flying the manufacturer’s C909 regional jets. The news comes as the budget carrier has opted not to extend its lease period for the planes, which had begun in April.
COMAC’s Dubai Debut Will Take Place Next Month
Falling towards the end of the year, the Dubai Airshow typically represents one of the last major events in the aviation calendar. Hosted every two years, it will return next month from November 17 to 21, and, this time around, it is set to welcome a new visitor. Specifically, as noted by Gulf News, Chinese planemaker COMAC will be making its Dubai Airshow bow in 2025, and exhibiting multiple aircraft in the process.
This won’t just be COMAC’s first appearance in Dubai, but, in fact, its maiden major showcase anywhere in the Middle East. This region is a veritable hotbed of commercial aviation, and one that will prove to be a key battleground for COMAC in its attempts to penetrate the stronghold that Airbus and Boeing have retained on the jet market for many years. Timothy Hawes, MD of event organizer Informa, said:
“We have COMAC, the Chinese manufacturer, that will also be coming for the very first time. [It] will have four aircraft on display, as well as taking part in the actual flying display.”
VietJet Has Ceased Operating Its C909s
COMAC has plenty of reasons to be optimistic about its prospects, not just at the Dubai Airshow in 2025, but, indeed, across the international market as a whole in the long term. For instance, Gulf News quotes Dubai Airports CEO Paul Griffiths as stating that “if you look at the developments with automotive products coming out of China, (…) they may well be making quite a statement in the aerospace industry.”
However, one international market where things don’t appear to have quite worked out for the Chinese planemaker is Vietnam. Earlier this year, it was reported that Vietnamese budget carrier VietJet Air would be leasing two examples of the COMAC C909, formerly known as the ARJ21, to replace Embraer E190 orders that had fallen through. These aircraft came from Chengdu Airlines on a wet-leased basis.
The purpose of this was to serve domestic routes from Con Dao Island to Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, with a pair of Chinese jets secured on a six-month lease from April 2025. However, as reported by Reuters, VietJet Air has opted not to renew this contract, with sources close to the matter having also said that the carrier has no plans to buy COMAC jets in the long term. They ceased operations on October 18.
VietJet Air’s Relationship With The C909
Vietjet Air’s leased pair of COMAC C909 regional aircraft from Chengdu Airlines, Reuters notes, entered service in April 2025 after a state visit from Chinese President Xi Jinping to Hanoi. This, it was hoped, would lay the foundations for the two countries to strengthen their economic ties.
With COMAC having found non-Chinese operators of its aircraft hard to come by, there will have been considerable optimism regarding the use of two C909s on domestic routes within Vietnam. However, with the deal being a wet-lease arrangement that included crew and maintenance, the Vietnamese low-cost carrier is reported to have struggled with high operating costs relating to the foreign crew.
Despite this proving too much for VietJet Air to overcome in terms of continuing to operate the leased C909s, The Star notes that, according to sources close to the matter, neither aircraft encountered any operational issues. At the time of writing, both were airborne on their way back to China.
