Meet Federica Maiorano
Federica Maiorano based in Monaco, is a maritime executive whose career has been built inside the commercial realities of global shipping rather than around it. With more than a decade of hands-on experience across tanker broking, strategy, and executive leadership, she operates at the intersection of shipping, commodities, and technology. Currently serving in senior advisory and executive roles, Federica is known for staying close to operational decision-making while questioning legacy processes that no longer reflect today’s market complexity. Her work focuses on how data, capital, and technology shape commercial outcomes in shipping. As a maritime commentator and industry contributor, she brings a disciplined, experience-led perspective to discussions on digitalization, sustainability, and long-term value creation. What sets her apart is not visibility, but credibility earned through execution, accountability, and consistency.
The Discipline Behind the Decisions
Long before technology platforms, capital strategy, or maritime innovation became the focus of her professional life, Federica Maiorano learned something more fundamental: serious industries demand seriousness of intent. Born and raised in Naples, Italy, Federica spent her formative years in a city defined by movement, trade, and consequence. Yet geography alone did not shape her professional direction. What influenced her most was early exposure to responsibility listening in on conversations about risk, decision-making, and long-term outcomes, often tied to an industry that operates quietly behind everyday life. What stayed with her was not a single moment, but a way of thinking.
Federica reflects, “What shaped me wasn’t a single place or moment, but an early understanding that serious industries require seriousness of intent.”
Complex systems only work when individuals take ownership of their role within them. This mindset became foundational. Before learning what role she might play professionally, Federica learned how systems function, how accountability works, and why credibility is built through consistency rather than visibility.These principles would later become the backbone of her approach across broking, strategy, and technology.
Foundation: Learning How Systems Actually Work
Federica’s academic journey mirrors her global, systems-oriented outlook. She pursued business, economics, and finance across Europe and the United States, studying at institutions including Bocconi University, Central European University, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, and completing a Master’s degree in Shipping, Trade, and Finance at Bayes Business School. But it was never theory alone that interested her. From the outset, Federica was drawn to environments where decisions met consequence, where data, judgment, and accountability intersected in real time.
Early professional roles in market research and shipping operations reinforced this orientation. Working with energy and freight data, she gained first-hand exposure to how geopolitical shifts, capital flows, and commodity movements ripple through maritime markets.
These formative years established a pattern that would define her career: staying close to reality, resisting abstraction for its own sake, and valuing relevance over trend.
Entering Shipping: Learning the Business From the Inside
Federica’s professional ascent began on shipbroking desks settings where clarity, trust, and timing are non-negotiable. Her earliest professional experiences included internships and trainee roles in chartering, market research, and broking across Paris, Barcelona, London, and Budapest. These positions placed her close to the mechanics of shipping operations, contracts, and market reporting. At MOL Group, she worked as a Market Research Analyst, producing weekly reports using benchmark data from Platts and Reuters.
This role sharpened her understanding of energy markets and competitive positioning. Soon after, she joined RS Platou ASA as a Brokering Trainee, where she rotated across S&P and LNG desks, supporting contract reviews, vessel valuations, and voyage estimations. These early roles were not glamorous, but they were formative. They taught her how decisions are made under pressure, how markets respond to information, and how accountability functions within commercial shipping.
A Turning Point: Recognizing the Gap Between Complexity and Tools
There was no single dramatic moment that redirected Federica Maiorano’s career. Instead, it was a gradual realization: shipping’s complexity was increasing faster than its ability to manage information and risk. Federica shares, “Shipping was deeply misunderstood and under-innovated, and that gap represented an opportunity.”
During her time at Riverlake Group, Shipping 360 Ltd, and BRS Brokers, she saw firsthand how decisions involving capital, freight, and long-term exposure were often made without the integrated tools such complexity demanded. The problem was not a lack of expertise, but a lack of infrastructure to support better decisions. That realization led her to the intersection of shipping and technology. Importantly, her approach was never driven by abstract innovation. She believed that meaningful change would only come from working alongside operators, brokers, and decision-makers who lived the problems daily.
“Meaningful change wouldn’t come from theory or external pressure, but from building tools alongside the people who actually live the problems every day,” Federica shares.
That mindset has defined her work ever since, whether in strategy roles, executive leadership, or advisory positions.
Strategy, Technology, and Executive Leadership
The next phase of Federica’s career brought her closer to strategy and technology. She joined Spot Ship, where she progressed from Vice President of Strategy to Chief Commercial Officer, and later Advisor. In these roles, she focused on aligning commercial execution with long-term strategic thinking, particularly where shipping intersects with data, decision-making, and technology. Her appointment as Chief Executive Officer of OCEANIS Tech GmbH represented a natural extension of this trajectory.
Reflecting on the moment, she shared, “Covering this role for a company that has consistently been at the forefront of ship financing represents not just a career milestone but the culmination of years of dreaming, learning, and growing.”
At OCEANIS Tech, her focus has been on enabling better-informed investment decisions in shipping by addressing fragmented data and legacy processes. Her leadership approach emphasizes clarity, accountability, and relevance over trends or visibility. Her relationship with shipping is deeply personal. Federica reflects, “Shipping is not just an industry, but a way of living.” She values its mentorship culture, interconnectedness, and the fact that real, career-defining conversations often happen without hierarchy.
Leadership Grounded in Accountability
As Federica’s responsibilities expanded into strategy and executive leadership, her approach remained consistent. She did not see leadership as visibility or popularity. For her, leadership meant clarity, accountability, and relevance. Three principles guide how she leads and makes decisions: ownership, relevance, and humility. “Ownership means taking full responsibility for outcomes, good or bad,” Federica shares.
Relevance keeps the focus on solving real problems rather than chasing trends, while humility reinforces the importance of listening in a global, technical industry where no one has all the answers. These values shape how she hires, how she builds teams, and how she works with partners. Debate is encouraged, but alignment after decisions is non-negotiable. Execution, in her view, is what earns trust.
A Voice Within the Industry
Beyond her executive roles, Federica is an active maritime commentator, writing and speaking on topics including digitalization, decarbonization, commodities, and the future of shipping. Her publication, Technology Applications in Shipbroking and Commercial Shipping, reflects her commitment to practical innovation grounded in real industry needs. She has also been deeply involved with WISTA International through its Technology and Futures Committee, contributing to dialogue around technology’s impact on the maritime sector and advocating for diversity in leadership. She believes the industry benefits when different perspectives are welcomed, provided they are backed by competence and commitment.
Federica reflects, “Shipping is not just an industry, but a passion, a way of living.” For her, it is an ecosystem built on mentorship, interconnectedness, and shared responsibility.
Looking Ahead: Shaping What Comes Next
Today, Federica’s focus is on exploration, contribution, and long-term impact. She is deeply embedded across the maritime ecosystem, working with operators, investors, founders, and policymakers to understand where real leverage exists. Her interest lies where shipping intersects with capital markets, energy transition, data intelligence, and operational resilience. She is deliberate about what comes next. “The right opportunity in this sector requires patience, credibility, and timing,” Federica shares.
For Federica, progress in shipping will not come from a single product or company, but from a more connected and informed ecosystem. At its core, her journey reflects a belief that leadership does not require fitting existing molds. “Trust is earned through consistency, execution, and a willingness to stay close to reality,” she reflects. As shipping continues to evolve, Federica Maiorano remains committed to building what comes next with seriousness of intent, respect for the past, and accountability for the future.
Empowering Lessons from the Path of Federica Maiorano
- “Leadership is about clarity and accountability, not popularity.”
- “Progress comes from solving real problems, not chasing trends.“
- “Accountability to real-world impact defines meaningful leadership.“
Editorial Note: A Leader Who Leaves the Light On
Some leaders command attention. Others create clarity. Federica Maiorano belongs to the latter, the kind of leader who makes complex environments more navigable, not louder. Her career reflects a steady presence in an industry defined by scale, risk, and consequence, where credibility is earned through discipline and decisions carry real weight. As shipping moves through technological, financial, and structural transition, her work continues to illuminate practical paths forward grounded in experience, and guided by responsibility.
