Caitlin Hardy is the Founder and Managing Director of Ness Sea Consulting. She began her career as a naval architect, focusing on workboats, commercial fishing vessels, sealifts, passenger vessels, and salvage.

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Utilizing her engineering background, she moved into project management roles for new vessel construction. As her experiences shifted from engineering on a single vessel to building a class of multiple vessels, she moved to the cruise industry to oversee continuous improvement across fleet operations for four operating lines. This experience of navigating the considerations for an operating company from a single vessel to looking across an operating company's entire fleet has given her unique insights into navigating the value propositions and challenges at each decision-making point.

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After completing her MBA, she spent time in two Series A startups focused on different aspects of the maritime and defense industries in cybersecurity and vessel analytics in product and leadership roles. Most recently, she led the US entity of Kongsberg Discovery, focused on expanding the company's offerings across all four product centers in the US, including establishing a US AUV team primarily to serve defense customers. 

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She holds a Bachelor of Science in Naval Architecture from the US Naval Academy and an MBA from the University of Washington, Foster School of Business.  Currently, she serves as the Co-Vice Chair on the Board of Washington Maritime BLUE and on the Editorial Board of Lloyd's List. In her free time, she loves to explore the Pacific Northwest with her family and friends, from sailing and kayaking on the water to skiing in the mountains.