New Zealand were one point away from promotion to the world group at last year's Fed Cup women's teams event.
They'll look to make that jump when the Asia-Oceania zone begins in New Delhi next week.
Spearheaded by Marina Erakovic, the squad includes rising doubles exponent Leanne Baker and French-based sisters Paula and Eden Marama. New Zealand will be vying for the two promotion playoff spots in a field of eight.
Four teams - Australia, China, India and Korea - are seeded. The other four, Chinese Taipei, Kazakhstan, Singapore and New Zealand, find out who they are grouped with before play starts on Wednesday.
The top two in each pool play crossover games to find the qualifiers to meet the bottom two teams from world group 2 next month.
Had New Zealand beaten Indonesia last year, they would have been one step from world group 2. The Marama sisters had a match point in the second set, lost the tiebreak and the match in three sets, after Erakovic had won and the now-retired Shelley Stephens lost.
New Zealand finished second behind Thailand in their group last year. Indonesia and Thailand play their world group ties against Germany and Croatia next week.
Non-playing captain Pavlina Nola is optimistic of fifth-ranked New Zealand's chances. "I'm really positive about it," she said. "We have a better team than last year."
Tennis: World status in sights
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