The Qantas group is likely to extend its Jetstar budget airline business with further franchisees following the incorporation of a Vietnamese airline as the second Southeast Asian user of the Australian no-frills brand. As four Asia-Pacific aviation groups maneuver for the region’s potentially vast budget airline market, setting up foreign affiliates like players placing pieces on a checkerboard, the Australian airline has become the first to move in heavily populated Vietnam, a country that seems ripe for low-cost aviation.

Vietnam’s Pacific Airlines will expand into international routes late this year in direct competition with AirAsia and Tiger Airways as part of its long-expected integration into the Qantas group’s Jetstar franchise. The Vietnamese carrier’s fleet will grow by 2014 from the current four Boeing 737-400s to as many as 30 Airbus A320s, the first of which will arrive in August. The aircraft will be fitted with 180 seats and will presumably come from the 68 A320-family aircraft that Qantas ordered last year to support growth of the Jetstar brand.

Oasis Hong Kong Airlines may fly again despite the suspension of flights and appointment of a liquidator last week. The liquidator, accounting firm KPMG, says it has been talking to a “comfortable number of really serious players,” local media report. Although Oasis ceased flying on April 9, the liquidator has retained its employees, evidently judging that the chance of finding a buyer is good enough to justify running up further debt at a business that is no longer earning revenue.