Persistent rumors had been around for a few weeks that Mitsubishi Heavy Industries might discontinue the Spacejet program. The die was cast on Friday: the project will be discontinued, the company announced.

With the Spacejet, formerly Mitsubishi Regional Jet, Japan wanted extremely ambitiously to get its own airliner into the air. But from the beginning the project was marked by delays and setbacks. In terms of new orders, the company was always miles away from the most important competitors, such as Embraer.

The Mitsubishi Heavy Industries communication states that, given the status of the program and current market developments, there is no other choice. The decision that the launch customer ANA no longer has any need for regional jets in the middle of the corona pandemic may have had a decisive influence. The test program has been suspended for several months and the four prototypes have been parked in the USA, among other places.

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries wants to keep a "foot in the door" and leaves open whether the program should be restarted at a later date. In the long term, the expansion of the airline business remains an important goal. The group did not say whether this affects the Spacejet project, and if so in what form.