Overview
Varvarenko spent his early career inside the shipping industry, working in ship agency, shipbroking and as a chartering manager. He was head of the chartering department at CEC Lines from 2002 to 2006 and then director of the Odessa-based shipping company Kaalbye Projects from 2006 to 2009, handling project, oversized and steel cargo in the Mediterranean, Black Sea and Persian Gulf markets. In 2009 he started Varamar, opening its first office in Cyprus and its second in Odessa, and built it into a carrier of breakbulk, heavy, oversized and dry-bulk cargo with offices in 13 countries. He is also the founder of the Ukrainian Shipbrokers Club. He studied at Odessa National Maritime University and completed professional education at the Institute of Chartered Shipbrokers in the United Kingdom.
Alexander Varvarenko is the founder and chief executive of SHIPNEXT, a digital shipping marketplace and transportation platform owned and operated by Shipnext BV in Antwerp. The platform reads and processes shipping emails automatically, matches cargo to ships and covers breakbulk, dry-bulk, wet-bulk and containerised cargo, drawing on more than 85 databases through modules for trading, cargo and fleet monitoring, documents and ports. Shipnext dates its founding to May 2015 and launched publicly on 2 October 2017 for non-containerised, general, oversized and dry-bulk cargo. Dragon Capital Investments took a minority stake at launch on undisclosed terms, and the Hong Kong accelerator Betatron invested in 2019, when the company opened a representative office there. In 2023 Shipnext won a multi-year grant from Flanders Innovation & Entrepreneurship for AI and predictive analytics, with a first instalment of 400,000 EUR, and reported around 3,500 daily users. Partnerships followed with FONASBA in 2023, the Institute of Chartered Shipbrokers in 2024 and BIMCO's Technology Partnership Programme in 2025. Varvarenko also founded Varamar in 2009, a carrier of breakbulk, heavy, oversized and dry-bulk cargo with offices in 13 countries, including Antwerp. Since 2023 he has worked with MBM Consultancy on the Remora Concept, a net-zero design that reworks the lighter aboard ship system with self-propelled barges and a nuclear-powered mothership.
Career history
In the news
- That's what many people think I'm like in real life. Fortunately, it's only true one day a year. 👻
- I guess it is now clear to many of you what today's drone attack on mv Contship Jet (IMO 9348625), in Bulgarian conomic zone, a ship heading from Israel to Constantza, mean. When Russia attacks received no adequate response from Europe or NATO. The attacks already started. Drones, a few thousands of euro worth, launched at individual targets, have so far not triggered a response. This means attacks will escalate. At some point both sides may start exchanging drone attacks, because killing people and destroying infrastructure
- Unfortunately that's a fact
- Next generation Mr. Varvarenko is more about cyber security and compute, than shipping. Well done, especially considering that 280+ teams too part.
- The live Post congestion on SHIPNEXT actually unveils an interesting fact. There is a huge spread between the waiting times of different vessels of a certain type. Which is very interesting, considering the fact that, for example, Fujairah is a small port anyway. Why do you think that is the case?
- When I say that "email is the industry's weakest link" - I speak of examples like this. Here is a typical time waster, when a complex cargo is circulate to hundreds of receivers without actually mentioning what the cargo is. And that is exactly why I am pushing for these changes to take place. So many shipping companies experience this one and only problem, which kills everyone's time and productivity.
- Shipnext now officially covers more countries than any other communications platform. This is felt especially when you can open your laptop and work and communicate "like home" in a usual and safe environment regardless of where you are. #China #Asia #Vietnam #Hongkong #UAE #Saudiarabia #Russia #Indonesia #Kazakhstan #Uzbekistan #Turkey
- It seems we may not need so many data centers anyway. Nowadays AI agent does not necessarily need a data center to operate. It needs a model, computing resources, and access to whatever tools and data it uses. All three can, in principle, be available on your laptop. There are already quite a few open-weight AI models that you can download and run on your own computer, allowing you to use AI and even build your own AI agents without sending your data to external servers. You can also fine-tune these models for specific tasks,
This page shows public professional information only, each fact cited. Is this you? send a correction, or ask for removal within 24 hours, no questions asked.