Ardmore Shipping Corporation (NYSE: ASC) (“Ardmore”) has announced the appointment of Dr. Kirsi Tikka to the company’s Board of Directors.
Dr. Tikka has over 30 years of shipping experience having recently retired from the American Bureau of Shipping (“ABS”) in July 2019. She joined ABS in 2001 and held various specialist and leadership positions within ABS including as ABS Executive Vice President Global Marine, Europe Division President, and as Vice President and Chief Engineer, Global. Her most recent ABS role was as Executive Vice President, Senior Maritime Advisor, where she was responsible for aligning ABS strategic planning, client development, and product and service offerings with the industry’s technical needs and requirements.
From 1996 to 2001, Dr. Tikka was a professor of Naval Architecture at the Webb Institute in New York, where she was also awarded an honorary doctorate in 2018. In addition to teaching, she carried out research on tanker structural strength and risk analysis, as well as being actively involved in the U.S. National Research Council Marine Board studies on double hull tankers. Dr. Tikka also worked for Chevron Shipping in San Francisco and Wärtsilä Shipyards in Finland.
Dr. Tikka holds a Doctorate in Naval Architecture and Offshore Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, and a Master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering and Naval Architecture from the University of Technology in Helsinki. She is a Fellow of both the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers (“SNAME”) and the Royal Institution of Naval Architects (“RINA”). In 2012, she received SNAME’s David W. Taylor Medal, the highest technical honour for naval architecture or marine engineering. Dr Tikka is also a director on the board of Pacific Basin Shipping Limited and is currently a Foreign Member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering and a member of the UK Women in Maritime Task Force.