About

A skilled professional with a consistent background and solid legal experience Hugo Cruz Maestri has been enrolled at the Brazilian Bar for almost twenty years, served in numerous in-house positions, and as a university professor. Currently, he acts as the legal affair director for Hamburg Süd Brazil, a Brazilian shipping company that is part of Hamburg Sud, a leading global shipping giant. Maestri is responsible for the legal, claims, insurance, risk management and the AFRMM (Brazilian import tax) departments, and he has focused on strategy, people management, issues involving competition, maritime, international, corporate, civil and labour law. He also exercises the role of regional compliance coordinator of Hamburg Süd for the regional south east, which comprises of Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay and acts as the coordinator for the legal committee of the International Shipowners Association – Centronave. Prior to his current role he has also served as contracts and legal manager for several years in a steel mill of the world’s largest steel company, with general performance focused on contracts, pension funds, civil, labour, among others. Maestri is a business-oriented leader driving strategic projects that add value to the organisations in which he served and for advising senior management on relevant matters relating to the business or interests of the company. In the last three years he has coordinated the importation process of six modern and brand new containerised vessels with total capacity of transportation around 25,000 Teus (a container unit), the biggest group investment at that point in time and equivalent to US$300m. Maestri says, ‘this project had a preparation of six months (studies, analysis of possible alternatives, pros and cons, tax analysis) and was concluded in 18 months. It was considered a milestone in the history of the Brazilian company and was the beginning of the company renovation in the shipping market’. Maestri has also led a discussion with the Brazilian Antitrust Authority to define specific shipping agreements classifications and whether they were considered associative agreements, and organised the construction of seven tugboats since 2015 all to be delivered by the end of 2018. Maestri is an important voice within the industry, publishes papers and was invited twice to be a speaker in international labour organisation seminars in Torino and Geneve.