As already announced, there is a second Managing Director at Hartmann Shipping since March 1 st : Mr. Jan-Lars Kruse (37). He is responsible for the financial part, while Capt. Michael Ippich, Managing Director of the company since August 2011, accounts for the company’s technical matters.

Trained banker Jan-Lars Kruse knows the Hartmann Group virtually from day one of his working life at Hamburgische Landesbank (a predecessor of HSH Nordbank). Starting his career at the bank’s ship financing department in 1996, he learned the business from scratch (including projects with the Hartmann Group). For 15 years he remained with HSH Nordbank, assuming various positions at the headquarters in Hamburg, up to and including head of one of the domestic shipping units. From 2007 to 2011 he worked as Relationship Manager for shipping in Singapore and headed the Asian shipping team.

Mr. Kruse is experienced in ship financing, but he has a maritime background, too. “I love shipping and I could never image to work in a business other than shipping”, he says. Actually, his grandfathers worked in fishing and his father sailed as a Captain and later worked as an independent surveyor. As a boy, Jan-Lars Kruse accompanied his father quite often. “It’s a good basis for discussions when you`ve been on board vessels yourself.”

Summarizing his time in Singapore, he says: “It was not the easiest of times, given the global financial crisis and its impact on shipping. But it was a very good time to learn. It enabled me to view shipping from a very global point of view: How do ship owners cope with the situation on an international scale? Which solutions do they choose? It was a good experience and broadened my perspective.”

Crisis or not, after 15 years in banking, Jan-Lars Kruse found it was time to “move to the other side of the shipping industry’s desk”. When asked to become Managing Director at Hartmann Schiffahrt, he considered it the right time and the right company.

He holds a great deal of respect for his new position, stating that “to follow in these footprints is a huge responsibility”. Overriding task for the next weeks will be to learn – about the company and especially about people, names and faces. Jan- Lars Kruse is married and has a daughter of one and a half years. In his (rare) spare time he likes to spend time with his family and play golf.