German shipping veteran Nils Aden is joining Harren & Partner from 1 May.

The 48-year-old executive will join the expanding Bremen-based shipping company as managing director for global ship management services and strategic developments.

The move sees Aden rejoin the company where he started his shipping career, before spending the intervening two decades working with some of the largest German ship management companies.

Aden most recently worked for nearly two years up to the end of 2020 as managing director of the Hamburg office of ship manager V. Ships Germany.

In that role, he helped oversee the merger of V. Ships with the container shipping operations of Norddeutsche Reederei H Schuldt in late 2018.

Prior to that, Aden was chief executive of Erck Rickmers ship management division, ER Schiffahrt, where he worked from 2012 until the sale of its operations to the Zeaborn Ship Management in February 2018.

Aden remained with Zeaborn for a brief period as its CEO until the end of 2019.

Expanding group

The appointment comes as Harren & Partner is expanding its shipping operations in the heavylift, multipurpose and dry bulk segments.

The German company is growing in the heavylift sector with a joint venture formed this month with Dutch specialist Jumbo Shipping.

This follows the acquisition by Harren & Partner of SAL Heavy Lift from Japan’s K Line in 2017.

Harren & Partner has also been expanding its dry bulk operations through a cooperation formed last year with Germany’s Bremer Bereederungsgesellschaft.

“I am extremely pleased that Nils is becoming part of our team now. He has tremendous experience in the shipping industry and will bring enormous creativity and drive to this role,” Martin Harren, managing director of Harren & Partner, said.

“We are convinced that getting Nils on board will put us in a very good position for the future. Together, we want to set new standards and develop our group further.”

Aden said in a statement he was "looking forward to further develop the group’s long-term growth path".

“This is a very compelling organisation that I am proud to join, again,” he said.