John Hulmes, Chair of the London International Shipping Week 2025 (LISW25) Steering Group, has combined industry and government experience with leaders drawn from the next generation in selecting his team to help manage this must attend global shipping event.
Chris Shirling-Rooke, CEO of Maritime UK; Gemma Griffin, Vice President & Head of Global Crewing at DFDS; together with Geraint Evans, Chief Executive, UK Major Ports Group; Rhett Hatcher, Chief Executive Officer of the UK Chamber of Shipping; Sharon Jones from the UK Ministry of Defence; and Lars Lippuner, Director of UK Customer Maritime Services at the MCA; and the newly appointed Commercial and Operations Director of Shipping Innovation, Andy Snell; join past SG members Jos Standerwick, CEO of Maritime London; Mark Jackson, CEO of The Baltic Exchange; Tom Chant, CEO at the Society of Maritime Industries; Jeremy Penn, former Chief Executive of the Baltic Exchange; Shahab Paya, Acting Deputy Director, Maritime Strategy and Programmes at the Department for Transport; as well as LISW co-founders and joint-CEOs Sean Moloney and Llewellyn Bankes-Hughes on the LISW25 SG.
Both the SG and the soon-to-be announced LISW 25 Board of Advisors will be managed by Shipping Innovation Director of Events Luci Llewellyn-Jones as part of the Shipping Innovation Secretariat.
Announcing his team, John Hulmes, former Chair of Mersey Maritime, paid tribute to the quality of leadership the individual members bring to the table.
“LISW is a major international maritime event that leads the discussion about the future of the industry, blue sky thinking and industry collaboration in everything it does. Shipping is entering a very interesting period of rapid change with the advancements being made in alternative fuels, digitalisation and AI vying for the headlines with the impact the changing geopolitical scene will have on established and newly created trade lanes.
“These and other issues such as increasing awareness of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion, the disruptive impact of the grey and dark fleets, and the increasing divergence between domestic, regional and international legal regimes, will dominate discussion during LISW25,” he added.
London International Shipping Week 2025 (LISW25) will play host to the maritime world in the week of 15-19 September 2025, with hundreds of events attracting thousands of international industry decision-makers into London. The variety of in-person events will be the broadest yet, while the competition is already heating up among sponsors eager to organise the most attractive networking events at the most glamourous venues in London.
