Changes to the VDR Management team

Prof. Dr Dirk Max Johns resigns from Management effective 15 August 2019

Prof. Dr Dirk Max Johns will be leaving the Management of the German Shipowners’ Association (Verband Deutscher Reeder, VDR) effective 15 August 2019. He plans to devote even more time and effort to his lecturing activities as Professor at the Hamburg School of Business Administration (HSBA) and will be available to the German Shipowners’ Association in
an advisory capacity in future. At the HSBA he is in charge of the university course of studies
of the Maritime Management bachelor programme as well as of the Business Development
master programme.

Johns, a member of the Management of the German Shipowners’ Association since 2012,
had initially joined the Association in 2005 as Director of Communications, and in the year
2010 he had been placed in charge of Centralised Services within the Association. In addition,
he was responsible for national and international employer topics and, for instance,
was a successful chief negotiator for the international maritime shipping industry at the International Labour Organisation (ILO) in Geneva. Previously he had spent ten years in managerial functions with the German TV station ZDF.

VDR President Alfred Hartmann cordially thanked Prof. Dr Johns (aged 53) for his past performance, adding: “I’m really pleased that he will continue to assist us as a consultant with
his expertise, experience and key contacts and that he will closely monitor labour law topics
of particular importance to maritime shipping and also represent the German Shipowners’
Association internationally.”

Prof. Dr Johns’ further tasks will be assumed by the members of Management, namely Ralf
Nagel as Chief Executive Officer and Dr Martin Kröger as Managing Director, in tandem with
their past activities.