Kawarau Jet intends to oppose Thunder Jet's applications to the Environment Court to operate sightseeing trips this summer.
This is likely to result in a hearing in Queenstown or Wanaka on December 3.
Queenstown Water Taxis Ltd, trading as Thunder Jet, requested under the Resource Management Act an early resource consent for four trips a day it operated last summer.
The fledgling commercial operator asked for an order to strike out specified grounds for appeals.
Judge Jon Jackson said in his decision he would need to hear from the other parties before he could decide on the applications.
If the applications were opposed, a short procedural hearing would most likely be held, and the judge would write a decision if the application were successful.
Judge Jackson directed that any notices of opposition were to be lodged by November 19. Any responses by the applicant were to be lodged by November 26.
Kawarau Jet director Andy Brinsley, of Queenstown, said on Monday Kawarau Jet would oppose the applications but was open to mediation.
Thunder Jet spokesman Duncan Storrier, of Ashburton, said the company wanted to operate on the water again as soon as possible.
"The grounds of Kawarau Jet's appeal are frivolous, so we're obviously responding to that," he said.
At the same time, Thunder Jet was taking action to start work, he said.
Thunder Jet had not received a request for mediation from Kawarau Jet, he said.
Kawarau Jet Services Holdings Ltd and sister rafting company Clearwater Pursuits Ltd are the only parties to appeal a Queenstown Lakes District Council decision to grant Queenstown Water Taxis consent to operate commercial jet-boats on Lake Wakatipu and the Kawarau River. The council was named as the respondent in court proceedings.
Kawarau Jet claimed Queenstown Water Taxis' resource consent applications at the hearing in July were "significantly different" from the applications lodged with the council and publicly notified, in its notice of appeal in September.
Kawarau Jet claimed there was no jurisdiction for independent commissioners John Matthews and Leigh Overton to hear or determine the applications, saying the commissioners failed to adequately consider the impacts of the proposed activity on the waterway environment, amenity values, district plan noise standards, Kawarau Jet's consented operations, and "the significant adverse safety and traffic effects and other risks" to Kawarau Jet and other waterway users.
If required, Judge Jackson would organise an evidence exchange timetable for a substantive hearing on the Environment Court appeal, which could be held next year.
