Dubai: Etihad Airways President and Chief Executive James Hogan has stepped down from the Virgin Australia board less than a year after he took up his seat.

The Australian-born executive cited “other commitments” preventing him from devoting “the time needed for the role,” in a Virgin Australia statement to the Australian Securities Exchange on Wednesday.

Etihad declined to comment further.

Hogan is the vice-chairman of four of seven of the airlines that Etihad has spent more than a billion dollars in recent years buying stakes in. Most recently, it spent €560 million (Dh2.3 billion) on a deal for a 49 per cent holding in Italy’s ailing Alitalia, where Hogan took on the position of vice-chairman.

“With the size of Alitalia and the attention Etihad needs to give to bringing it to financial health, it’s inevitable that James Hogan will need to focus more of his energies on this crucial task,” UK-based John Strickland, Director of JLS Consulting said by email.

Hogan’s alternative director at Virgin Australia, Australian-born Etihad Chief Financial Officer James Rigney, has also resigned from his role.

Etihad retains its seat

Etihad Chief Operating Equity Partner Bruno Matheu will now sit on the Virgin Australia board instead of Hogan. Matheu is a former Air France senior executive. His alternative director is Etihad Senior Vice President Finance Equity Partner Ulf Huttmeyer, former Air Berlin finance chief.

Virgin Australia offered its three airline shareholders — Etihad, Singapore Airlines and Air New Zealand — seats on the board after they backed an A$350 million capital raising in 2013. Hogan was the first of the three airline executives to announce he would take a seat on the board.

“I will sit on the board. I am an Australian, I know the market,” Hogan told the Australian Financial Review in January 2014. Hogan took up the seat in July later that year and was subsequently joined by Singapore Airlines chief Goh Coon Pong and Air New Zealand boss Christopher Luxon.

Etihad is the second largest shareholder in Virgin Australia, increasing its stake to 24.2 per cent last month.

Hogan’s departure from the Virgin Australia board came just a day before Virgin Australia’s half-year financial results announcement on Thursday.