Image Source: Herald Sun

Virgin Australia has released a statement confirming it has bested Qantas in on-time performance for the Financial Year 2012, while its current alignment with Etihad is proving to be extremely successful.

According to BITRE statistics published last week, Virgin Australia branded and group airlines tallied an on-time performance rate of 82.7 percent, exceeding Qantas brand airlines (81.2 percent) and Qantas group airlines (80.1 percent).

Virgin Australia chief John Borghetti was pleased with these results and excited about Virgin’s current prosperity with partner airline, Etihad Airways.

“We set ourselves a target of achieving certain goals within three years,” Mr Borghetti said.

“We've just entered the third year and we've almost achieved all of them.”

Virgin’s domestic business in Australia has doubled in recent years thanks to its partnership with airlines such as Singapore Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Etihad and Air New Zealand, according to the Courier Mail.

"In fact, it's almost trebled, so it's been a very beneficial relationship, as have the other relationships we have," Mr Borghetti said on ABC-TV's Inside Business.

Etihad recently increased its stake in Virgin Australia by 5 percent, following approval from the Foreign Investment Review Board, now totalling a 10 percent share.

In June of this year, Qantas Airways chief Alan Joyce expressed fears Etihad’s growing stake in Australia would undercut profitability on domestic routes and may force the airline to reduce a number of its services.

Mr Borghetti has dismissed the concerns.

“There's a lot of misinformation and a lot of jumping at shadows in the market and I think people should take a cold shower,” he said.

“There is no massive capacity share grab here.”

Etihad Airways chief executive James Hogan labelled Qantas’ attack on the Abu-Dhabi based carrier as “disappointing” and “not representative of the market or the country or the people.”