The VFW 614 was originally proposed in 1961 by the Entwicklungsring Nord (ERNO) group, comprising Focke-Wulf, Hamburger Flugzeugbau (HFB) and Weser as the E.614, a 36–40 seat aircraft powered by a pair of American-built Lycoming PLF1B-2 turbofan engines.

During this time, the West German industry underwent a substantial reorganisation, resulting in the establishment of Vereinigte Flugtechnische Werke (VFW), based at Bremen, Germany.

[4][6] Aerospace publication Flying Magazine accredits Fokker's involvement in the project with several refinements and changes to the emerging design of the VFW 614, which included the discarding of a T-tail in favour of a conventional unit, furnished with a low-set vertical stabilizer and dihedral.

[2] In addition, several risk sharing agreements had been concluded with other aviation companies, including Siebel Flugzeugwerke ATG (SEAT) in Germany, Fairey and SABCA in Belgium and Shorts in the United Kingdom.

[4] To speed up flight testing, the first and second prototypes, which were reportedly almost identical, were dispatched to Spain for three months of comprehensive trials to evaluate their performance under 'hot and high' conditions.

[4] On 1 February 1972, the programme was damaged by the loss of the first prototype, which was attributed to an instance of elevator flutter;[12] which played a role in further diminishing the order situation.

[12] The VFW-Fokker 614 was a twin-engined short haul regional airliner; it was developed as in part to serve as a replacement for the popular propeller-driven pre-war Douglas DC-3.

[8] The engine configuration allowed the adoption of a short, sturdy undercarriage, which was specially suited to performing operations from austere or otherwise poorly-prepared runways.

[20] One negative flight performance attribute was its stall characteristics, which was described as initially occurring "at almost the worst possible place – the inboard end of the ailerons".

The stalling regime was explored heavily during the flight test programme, which led to a re-profiling of the wing's leading edge for additional outboard camber being adopted on production aircraft to improve this performance.

[2] Reportedly, some Dutch managers did hold a preference for their own aircraft, regarding them as established successes and the VFW 614 as a waste of effort to market.

Dutch management was alleged by Mendenhall to have interfered with the firm's marketing structure to curtail independence and maintain support for their own aircraft.

According to authors H. Dienel and P. Lyth, Lufthansa's lack of interest in the type was attributed as having been a major factor in the commercial failure of the VFW 614.

Mendenhall reports that there had been a widespread sentiment amongst German employees that they had been regarded as being subordinate to Fokker, which had increased over time as the VFW 614's commercial failure had become more and more apparent.