Twelve years after the Honda Motor Co. announced the first flight of its experimental compact business jet, the HondaJet, the since formed Honda Aircraft is on the cusp of certification and entry-into-service of the first of what it anticipates will be a series of HondaJet aircraft.

Honda announced the first flight of the experimental HondaJet on Dec. 13, 2003. The prototype aircraft flew from Piedmont Triad Airport in North Carolina, near the location of the expansive headquarters campus that Honda has developed over the ensuing 12 years. That flight culminated research that had been under way since 1986. A timeline for the new aircraft had not been set then. But three years later, Honda Aircraft was formed and the order book officially opened.

Since December 2003, the HA-420 program has amassed more than 3,000 flight hours, with five production aircraft flying. At the recent NBAA convention, Honda Aircraft president and CEO Michimasa Fujino said the aircraft was concluding function and reliability testing, and that he anticipated certification and first deliveries by year-end. “We are expecting FAA type certification of the world’s most advanced light jet very soon,” Fujino had announced. Deliveries are expected to ramp up fairly quickly, since Honda Aircraft has 25 more aircraft on the production line.

Fujino, who has long maintained that Honda Aircraft was never meant to be a one-aircraft company, reiterated that stance, saying the aircraft was designed to be scalable into a broader series. But he was not yet ready to reveal what might be next.