Hapag-Lloyd, a leading liner shipping company, announced that Hans Schäfer, current Managing Director Global Sales in the Group’s Hamburg Headquarters, will take up the position of Senior Managing Director for Asia, as of 1st July, 2020.
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Schäfer will replace Lars Christiansen, who will resign from his position as Senior Managing Director Region Asia effective 30th June, 2020. Christiansen will return to his home country Denmark for family reasons.
Hans Schäfer can look back to an outstanding career in the Hapag-Lloyd Group. Schäfer started at the company in 1994 as a trainee at the company headquarters and since then he has held several management positions in Vietnam, Singapore and Hamburg. He took over his current position as Managing Director Global Sales in 2014. Schäfer will relocate to Singapore together with his family.
“We are very pleased that we have been able to fill this key position with an outstanding logistics professional. With Hans Schäfers’ experience and commercial understanding, we will not only have a strong foundation for managing one of our key markets in these challenging times but also for additional growth in Asia in the future,” said Rolf Habben Jansen, CEO of Hapag-Lloyd.
Christiansen worked at Maersk for 20 years, holding various management positions in Denmark, China and Singapore. Starting 2006, he joined the UASC in both Singapore and Dubai, where he became a member of the Executive Management in 2012, as the Chief Trade Officer of the company.
Christiansen joined Hapag-Lloyd in the spring of 2017 through the UASC merger and headed the company’s Region Middle East until he took over his current position as the Senior Managing Director Region Asia in April 2018.
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“We owe our sincerest thank you to Lars Christiansen. He has given a tremendous contribution for Hapag-Lloyd during the UASC integration and by leading two of our major regions. We wish Lars all the best for the future,” said Hapag-Lloyd CEO, Rolf Habben Jansen.