Mr. Harris Antoniou has held various executive and management positions in leading institutions in the financial sector over the last 25 years, always focussing on on debt and equity investments in the energy, commodities & transportation sectors. He served as Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Management Board of Amsterdam Trade Bank from March 2016 to February 2020. Previously he was the Chief Executive Officer of AMCI – a private group that focusses in mining projects and operations, trading, transportation, and private equity investments. Between 2009 and 2013 he was the Managing Director of Energy, Commodities and Transportation, and a member of the Management Group of ABN AMRO, where he led the international expansion of the business. 

Mr. Antoniou is passionate about technology, education and digital transformation. He is a partner and a board member of Natech SA, a European Fintech that has been developing banking systems for financial institutions in more than 40 countries. Recently as a partner and board member of Advent Technologies Inc., a leading producer of fuel cells and core materials that revolutionize the energy sector, he was instrumental in the capital raising effort of the company and its Nasdaq listing. He was one of the first signatories of the Poseidon Principles, a supporter of United World Colleges in the Netherlands, and member of Abundance 360. Harris is also a board member of the non profit organization Komvos/Node – Networks of Global Hellenism.

Harris holds an MSc from the University of Piraeus and an MBA from Rotterdam School of Management (Erasmus University). He also successfully completed the General Management Program of Harvard Business School.

Mr. Elias Deftereos has 20 years of international experience in corporate finance and shipping.

Prior to joining Neptune Maritime Leasing in April 2022, Elias was an Advisor to Prime Marine and the Board of Directors of First Ship Lease Trust (SGX: D8DU or D8DU.SI), the ship leasing company listed on the Singapore Stock Exchange.

Previous experience includes Chief Financial Officer roles at HBC Asia, the Singapore office of Hamburg Bulk Carriers, and Globus Maritime, the dry bulk shipping company listed on the NASDAQ (NASDAQ: GLBS). Elias brings his extensive experience in investor relations, reporting, risk management, and fund raising as he has participated in capital raising exercises from the AIM, the NASDAQ, the SGX and the Athens Stock Exchange.

Elias has also been a part-time Lecturer on the Economics of Sea Transportation at the Greek Branch of the Institute of Chartered Shipbrokers.

For the period 1991 – 1996 Elias was a relationship manager for ABN AMRO Bank N.V. in London and Monaco (‘ABN AMRO’) covering shipping companies running out of Southern Europe.

Elias started his career as a Financial Analyst at the Onassis Family Office in Monaco.

Elias holds an MBA in Finance from Chicago Booth of the University of Chicago and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from the State University of New York in Buffalo.

CK Kwek has more than 30 years of banking experience with leading financial institutions across a number of corporate banking functions in structured finance, loan underwriting and distribution, maritime finance, and risk management.

Until recently, CK was the Chief Risk Officer at ABN AMRO Singapore. Prior to that he was Head of Shipping at Nordea Singapore and Head of Transportation at Fortis Singapore. He started his banking career with the Debt Capital Markets Group of ING Barings in 1993.

CK received his BBA (Merit) from the National University of Singapore and his MBA (Distinction) from New York University. He is also a certified Financial Risk Manager, and was a Guest Lecturer for the Executive Master of Maritime Administration program at Dalian Maritime University from 2008 to 2010.

Mr. Pericles Lykoudis has been active in Shipping Finance for 30+ years. For 22 years he served as Credit Officer of the Athens Shipping Finance team and later Branch Senior Credit Officer at Unicredit Bank AG (former Bayerishe Hypo und Vereinsbank). From 1992 to 1999 he worked at Credit Lyonnais Greece and its successor, Piraeus Prime Bank, initially in the Loans Administration department and later as a Relationship Manager.

Pericles holds an MSc in Shipping, Trade and Finance from the Cass Business School (City University of London) and a Bachelor’s Degree from the Panteion University of Athens.

Mr. Iraklis Tsirigotis has 10 years of international experience in finance and shipping.

Prior to joining Neptune Maritime Leasing in May 2021, he was the Head of Shipping Finance in Amsterdam Trade Bank N.V. in The Netherlands (‘ATB’). During his c. 5 year tenure with ATB, he was responsible for the overall development and management of ATB’s shipping finance business, including the establishment of numerous new banking relationships with maritime groups predominately in Europe and Northern America, and completion of numerous, multimillion credit facilities. For the period 2011 – 2016, Iraklis was a relationship manager in the Transportation department of ABN AMRO Bank N.V. in The Netherlands (‘ABN AMRO’) covering shipping companies running out of Northern Europe.

Iraklis holds of a Master of Science in Shipping, Trade and Finance from Cass Business School (City University of London) and a Bachelor of Science in Maritime Studies from University of Piraeus. Also, he has been a CFA chartholder since August 2016.

Mr. Stavros Tsoukatos has 10 years of experience in finance and shipping.

Before joining Neptune Maritime Leasing, Stavros was a Relationship Manager in the Shipping Recovery Department of Piraeus Bank and then Intrum Hellas, managing a diverse portfolio of shipping non-performing exposures. In this capacity, Stavros was involved in the implementation of numerous viable restructuring plans for distressed exposures, assisting clients’ return to profitability while optimizing loan recoveries. Furthermore, he was responsible for the onboarding, integration and efficient servicing of shipping portfolios acquired by external investors.

Stavros holds an MSc in Shipping, Trade and Finance from Cass Business School (City University of London) and a BSc in Economics from University of Athens.

Mr. Nikos Tzoumakas has been active in finance and shipping for 26 years.

For 14 years has served as Head of Shipping Back Office at Unicredit Bank AG (formerly known as Bayerische Hypo und Vereinsbank), Athens. Previously he has worked for Barclays, HSBC and Fortis in various posts, mainly in Corporate Loan Administration. Nikos holds a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Deree College.

Mr. Rik van der Kolk has 8 years of international experience in finance and shipping.

Before joining Neptune Maritime Leasing, Rik spent 5 years at Amsterdam Trade Bank N.V. in The Netherlands (‘ATB’), where he was a relationship manager in the Shipping Finance department. In this capacity, Rik was involved in the origination and establishment of new relationships with shipowners worldwide as well as the origination and execution of relevant credit facilities. Furthermore he was responsible for setting up the credit monitoring framework in ATB, in addition to a few other key procedures. Rik began his career working as a consultant for the Welten Group where he engaged in multiple, different projects, mainly for Rabobank Group in The Netherlands.

Rik has received a LLB in Dutch Law as well as a LLM in both Civil and Corporate Law from the University of Groningen. Also, he is registered as a Certified Compliance Professional since 2018.

Mr. Sakis Voudris has 15 years of experience in finance, shipping and private equity.

Before joining Neptune Maritime Leasing, Sakis spent four years in finance at Latsco Shipping, where he was involved in the acquisition and financing of a number of the group’s vessels. Prior to that, Sakis was a VP at AMCI’s private equity group, where he evaluated and executed equity and credit investments in shipping, energy and mining in the US and Europe. He begun his career at BNP Paribas and ABN Amro, where he worked in structured finance, investment banking and principal finance groups covering clients in shipping and energy in Europe. 

Sakis received a BS in Naval Architecture and Mechanical Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens, an MS in Mechanical Engineering from MIT and an MBA from the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Mr. Solbakken has had several senior positions within shipping and banking. Within shipping he has been CEO of Ship Finance International Ltd, Norwegian Car Carriers ASA and from 2012 until early in 2022 Ocean Yield ASA. During his tenure as CEO of shipping companies he has also been chairman of several related companies. Within banking he has been general manager of Fortis Bank, Oslo Branch. For Christiania Bank (now Nordea) he was SVP and deputy head of shipping, and head of equity issues.

Mr. Solbakken has a Master of Science degree from the Norwegian School of Economics.

Mr. Harris Antoniou has held various executive and management positions in leading institutions in the financial sector over the last 25 years, always focussing on on debt and equity investments in the energy, commodities & transportation sectors… more

Mr. James Bryant is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales and Head of Fund Operations at Highvern. James sits on the boards of a number of fund and corporate structures across a variety of asset classes in the private capital space.

Previously a director with a large international administrator, James headed up several large client relationships and sat on a number of fund boards including a renewable infrastructure fund and various real estate companies. Prior to working as an administrator, James was an audit Manager at PriceWaterhouseCoopers, Jersey where he specialised in the audit of hedge and private equity funds.

Mr. Alan Dunphy is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Ireland and Head of Corporates and Executives Incentives at LGL Group.

Alan, a Dublin City University graduate, has 15 years of experience in the offshore financial services industry. Previously, acted in the capacity of Jersey Managing Director for a global fund management group. Prior to this, Alan managed a multi-disciplinary team including accountants, lawyers, IT professionals and administrators involved in the administration of private equity and real estate funds, employee share plans, international pension plans, deferred compensation and employee benefit trusts.

Mrs. Katerina Eleftheriou has more than 20 years experience in shipping finance. During the last 16 years, she worked in the shipping department of HSBC Continental Europe where she was the Head of Shipping Greece and a member of the Bank’s Greek Executive Committee since October 2019. During this period, she grew the ship lending portfolio of the bank with public and private Greek maritime companies to $2.5bn, while she led various Asian ECA backed newbuilding syndicated transactions and the first sustainability linked shipping loans of HSBC. She also served as advisor in numerous maritime finance projects of other international HSBC sites. Katerina has invaluable experience in secondary trading and shipping loan portfolio sales.

Katerina was an active member of HSBC’s European Diversity & Inclusion Committee while she mentored and coached many young colleagues around Europe, in various leadership related areas.

Before joining HSBC, Katerina was a relationship manager in a Cypriot bank for 6 years, which was later acquired by Marfin Group, while she started her career in the finance department of a large private reefer and container shipping company based in Athens.

Katerina holds an MSc in Shipping, Trade & Finance from Cass Business School where she was awarded the Baltic Exchange and Bonno Krull Scholarships and a BSc in Management from Deree College where she was awarded Scholarships from the Alumni Association.

Mrs. Nikoletta Fouska is a senior investment professional with more than 25 years of international experience in investment management across asset classes. She has in depth experience in shipping, real estate, private equity and venture capital investments.

She is currently President and Chief Investment Officer at Latsco Family Office, based in Geneva. She started her career in Management Consulting with Oliver Wyman.

Nikoletta holds a BSc Computer Science and an MSc in Operations Research from MIT and an MBA from Harvard Business School .

Dr. Gabriella Kindert is a senior banking and investment professional specialized in Alternative Credit and Private markets. She gained over 20 years of international experience in managing investment portfolios over the cycle for leading institutional investors and global investment teams of alternative and fixed income strategies. She created and successfully launched several new, innovative private market investment strategies, to which she attracted institutional investor support.

She started her career in banking in 1998 in MeesPierson Corporate and Investment Banking, where she gained insight into various asset classes – asset-based finance, project finance, leveraged finance in different geographies. She held various managerial positions at Fortis Investments Structured Credit, BNP Paribas Asset Management as Global Head of Loans and at NN IP as Head of Alternative Credit till 2019. She is currently focusing on Non-Executive and advisory positions focused on Private market investment solutions.

She holds an M.A. in History, Economics, MBA in Accounting and Finance and a Ph.D. in Finance focusing on Alternative Lending Platforms.

Mr. Vassilios Mantzavinos has held various senior executive positions with European banking institutions over the past 33 years. From 2010 to 2022 he served as General Manager Greece of UniCredit Bank, and from 1999 until 2010 was the Head of Greek Shipping (of the then HypoVereinsBank).

Previously he was for 3 years Senior RM with HSBC Shipping Department and earlier served for 7 years in various positions with Barclays Bank in Athens and London.

In 2022 Vassilis joined Costamare Shipping Company for organizing its entry in the ship leasing activity.

Over the past 6 years, he has been the Vice President for the Association of Banking and Financial Executives of Hellenic Shipping.

Vassilis is a Fulbright Scholar holding a Master of Engineering from Cornell University, an MBA from Cass Business School, and a Diploma of Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens. Vassilis has studied piano performance at the Conservatory of Athens for 14 years.

Mr. Dimitrios Sofianopoulos  has studied law in Greece and the UK and has qualified as a Greek and UK lawyer. He has been working as equity partner of a major international law firm in NY, London, Monaco and Athens Greece from 1991 until August 2022.

As of 1 August 2022 he joined the Costamare Group of companies working for both the public and the private side.

In his long career Dimitri has worked with most Greek and international commercial banks, private equity houses, mezzanine lenders, builders and major Greek and foreign shipowners and has been involved in numerous transactions involving M&A, IPOs, JVs, NPL portfolios, commercial lending, leasing, single or fleet acquisitions, newbuildings, bareboat charters, COAs and other shipping related matters.