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Jetstar Group comprises Jetstar Airways in Australia and New Zealand, Jetstar Asia in Singapore, Jetstar Pacific in Vietnam and Jetstar Japan.
Jetstar Airways launched a daily Beijing-Melbourne flight with a stopover in Singapore on Nov 24. The carrier has 12 destinations in China.
China is already a battlefield for international budget carriers fighting for a share of the huge potential market.
A report by research company CIConsulting said that about 70 percent of all domestic routes in China are suitable for budget airlines, and it predicted that 25 percent of domestic services will be provided by low-priced carriers in 2013.
Singapore Airlines is scheduled to announce on Tuesday its plans for its new budget subsidiary, Scoot, to enter China's market. The carrier won't begin services for three months.
Two main budget airlines in Asia - AirAsia Bhd and Tiger Airways Singapore Pte Ltd - are also attracted to the Chinese market. AirAsia has 10 destinations in China, while Tiger Airways has four.
However, China Eastern's participation would not have a huge effect on China's budget aviation industry, analysts said, although it will be the first of China's three largest airlines to enter the budget aviation section.
"The new budget carrier is just something that China Eastern is trying out, and it doesn't mean the company will fully turn to budget aviation, " said Li Lei.
Li said the markets in Hong Kong and the mainland are different and China's carriers cannot cut most costs to the level of true budget airlines.
Compared with international budget carriers, China's carriers lack enthusiasm for the sector.
Spring Airlines, currently China's only budget carrier, has about 3 percent of the domestic civil aviation market.
"China's airlines will encounter more challenges than foreign carriers, because of the strict industry regulations in China," said Li Xuerong, aviation researcher at CIConsulting.
She said China's budget aviation is just taking off and cannot develop on a large scale in a short time.
wangwen@chinadaily.com.cn
