“What’s life without China? It turns out life will be OK. It’s not the way we want it, but it’ll be OK,” he said.

He added: “We should stay focused on the competition we have and try to win that technology race. And as we do so, keep ourselves in the league with respect to whatever China ultimately does.”

COMAC relies heavily on U.S. and European suppliers to make the C919, including its engine and many components necessary to power and control the plane. The company has said it plans to eventually start making 150 C919 planes a year, though analysts are skeptical about COMAC’s production capacity, particularly after years of delays in producing the plane in the first place.

The C919 has yet to be certified for use on international flights, but could over time fill a growing demand in China for single-aisle planes in domestic flight. By 2030, China is expected to need some 4,800 single-aisle jets like the C919 for regional travel, according to Herman Tse, an analyst at Cirium.

If the company is able to increase its production of the C919, he said, COMAC could become a popular choice for Chinese airlines and carve out a piece of the market, but it would still lag Boeing and Airbus.