Global Ship Lease, Inc. announced that effective as of June 17, 2022, the Board of Directors of the Company appointed Ms. Ulrike Helfer as a Term I Director until the Company's 2024 annual meeting of shareholders, filling the vacancy created by the resignation of Mr. Henry (Hank) Mannix III, which was effective as of the same date. The Board has determined that Ms. Helfer qualifies as an independent director. Ms. Helfer has more than 40 years of experience in the finance industry and more than 20 years of shipping experience.
She commenced her career in international ship financing in 2000 in Vereins- und Westbank AG (merged into UniCredit). In 2005, Ms. Helfer joined DVB Bank SE in Hamburg, where she became Deputy Head of the Global Container, Car Carrier, Intermodal & Ferry Group. In 2011, Ms. Helfer became the Chief Representative of DVB Bank in Greece.
She spent the preceding five years in Athens managing DVB's local office by reporting directly to the CEO of the bank. In 2016, Ms. Helfer was asked by the Federal State of Schleswig-Holstein and the City of Hamburg to become a Member of the Board of Managing Directors of the newly established portfoliomanagement AöR. In this role Ms. Helfer and her team had the responsibility of winding down a portfolio of non-performing shipping loans with an amount of EUR 4.1 billion transferred from HSH Nordbank AG to portfoliomanagement AöR. Ms. Helfer is also a Member of the Advisory Board of Deutsche Bundesbank in Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.
Global Ship Lease, Inc. is a United Kingdom-based containership owner, leasing ships to container shipping companies under industry-standard, fixed-rate time charters. The Company focuses on mid-size Post-Panamax and smaller containerships. As a containership owner, its business is both procyclical with chartered tonnage and counter-cyclical with sale and lease-back structures. The Company owns 68 containerships, ranging from 2,207 to 11,040 TEU, with a combined capacity of 375,406 TEU. 36 ships are wide beam Post-Panamax. The mix of ship sizes within its fleet provides flexibility to deploy its vessels on a range of trading routes. Its portfolio of vessels includes CMA CGM Thalassa, ZIM Norfolk, Anthea Y, ZIM Xiamen, MSC Tianjin, MSC Qingdao, GSL Ningbo, GSL Alexandra, GSL Effie, GSL Lydia, GSL Sofia, GSL Kalliopi, GSL Grania, GSL Eleni, Mary, Kristina, Katherine, Alexandra, Alexis, Olivia I, CMA CGM Berlioz, Agios Dimitrios, and GSL Christel Elisabeth, among others.