A maritime law specialist, having obtained an LLB and LLM in the field before embarking on her professional career in earnest, Georgina Panayiotou is legal manager for Limassol-based shipping company Internship Navigation.

As well as owning over 75 vessels, the company has expanded into third party ship and crew management for other vessel owners, one of a number of developments which Panayiotou has managed expertly via a constant expansion of the Intership Navigation legal function’s skills, she states: ‘Over the four years of heading the department, I have transformed it into a fully-fledged legal department, reflecting to a great extent the scope of activities [of] an internal law firm where a more spherical approach to legal matters takes place. The department is now capable and equipped to deal with the corporate management and administration of over 150 companies (ship owning, holding etc.) and more than 100 self-owned and third party vessels via ship management and crew management efforts’.

Panayiotou mentions a number of highlights which stand out among her career achievements to date. Firstly, her representation of the company on the Cyprus Shipping Chamber Legal Committee and the Development and Promotion Committee. This, she explains, ‘immensely widened [her] horizons in respect of legal matters affecting local and international shipping in terms of the implications on the industry’. Secondly, her active participation in the emergency response team of the company, which ‘developed [her] legal and coordination skills as well as the ability to master problem solving and under-pressure situations’.

Thirdly, being awarded the young leader of the year for 2016 by the Women’s International Shipping and Trading Association and Youngship Cyprus. She explains that this was both a considerable honour and a recognition of her legal skill and career achievements: ‘It was an acknowledgement of my contribution to the company I work for and the wider shipping industry in Cyprus, and a major highlight of my in-house career’.