The new Asia-Pacific office was a key symbolic step for the passenger jet maker in taking its aircraft overseas, China’s ambassador to Singapore, Cao Zhongming, said at the inauguration.

“It’s hoped that COMAC will make steady progress on the road of internationalisation,” he added, the embassy said in yesterday’s brief posting on the social media site Weixin.

This year COMAC has stepped up plans for production and sales of its C919 narrow-body passenger plane, which is in a category similar to Boeing’s 737 MAX and the A320neo planes of Airbus, although only flown within China.

COMAC has been marketing its planes outside China.

However, industry sources say it is a long way from making inroads internationally, especially without benchmark certifications from the EU, which it is pursuing for the C919 or the US.