Mitsubishi Aircraft has closed on a firm order for 32 MRJ90s from Japan Airlines, converting a letter of intent calling for delivery of the first airplanes in 2021, the companies announced on Wednesday.

Speaking in Tokyo at a joint press conference with Mitsubishi on August 28, Japan Airlines president Yoshiharu Ueki revealed plans to deploy the first of the MRJs on domestic routes flown by JAL Group subsidiary J-Air. Mitsubishi hopes to fly the MRJ90—the larger of the planned 78- and 92-seat regional jets—during this year’s second quarter. Schedules now call for certification and first delivery to Japan’s All Nippon Airways two years later.

In the meantime, plans call for the first example of an order from JAL for 15 Embraer E-Jets—announced at the same time the airline revealed the existence of the MOU with Mitsubishi—to arrive in Japan next year, at which time the Brazilian jets would start to supplement a fleet of 15 E170s now flown by J-Air out of Osaka and Tokyo International Airports and Fukuoka Airport. However, JAL plans to begin removing the Embraer jets in favor of the MRJs in 2021 and deploy a uniform fleet of Mitsubishi jets with J-Air by the middle of the next decade. 

Having now collected firm orders for 223 airplanes, Mitsubishi Aircraft has struggled to gain credibility in a market segment now led by the new Embraer E2s, all three models of which will also use Pratt & Whitney “geared turbofans” similar in design to the PW1200G used in the MRJ. The Japanese program has so far suffered three major delays since its launch in March 2008. The most recent setback resulted from the company’s failure to forecast the effects of new U.S. Federal Aviation Administration procedures introduced in 2009 to validate regulatory compliance of production processes. The new rules shifted Mitsubishi’s testing schedule by as much as two years, meaning, if all goes as now planned, the time between program launch and certification would span more than nine years.

Having committed some 180 billion yen ($1.7 billion) to the project, Mitsubishi declines to specify how many MRJs it estimates it needs to deliver to break even on the program or make a profit on it. Much of the investment has gone to preparing for final assembly at Mitsubishi Heavy Industries' Nagoya Aerospace Systems Works “Komaki South” plant in Aichi Prefecture, where plans call for operations to start in June 2016.