Lighthouse Chartering

What Lighthouse Chartering does

Lighthouse Chartering is a privately held ship chartering and brokerage firm headquartered in Houston, Texas, with additional offices in Zurich, Mumbai, and Singapore. The company was founded in April 2016 by CEO Mike Loeffel in partnership with Tricon Energy Ltd., and traces its origin to an in-house logistics and chartering department within a multi-billion-dollar energy trading firm. Lighthouse offers four integrated services — Chartering (freight optimization), Operations (ship and cargo movement tracking, ETA projection, and loading/discharge monitoring), Market Intelligence (vessel and market data for client decision-making), and Positions (identification of open space and cargo combinations across owners and charterers). The firm serves enterprise clients in the energy, chemical, and logistics sectors, with a publicly displayed roster of 30-plus named counterparties including Shell, Koch, Cargill, Maersk, Stolt, Odfjell, Hafnia, Valero, Suncor, Repsol, and Ultratank.

The business operates on a transaction-fee model, earning commissions and fees on each ship chartering fixture rather than SaaS subscriptions or asset-based revenue. Go-to-market is relationship-led, driven by direct enterprise engagement, industry-event participation (e.g., AFPM annual conferences), and curated client entertainment (annual ski trips in Jackson Hole, Telluride, Aspen), with supplementary top-of-funnel presence via Instagram, Facebook, and a quarterly email newsletter. The leadership and broker team is recruited from tier-one shipping and commodity houses — Stolt-Nielsen, Louis Dreyfus, Odfjell, Norgas, Clarksons Platou, GAC, Barclays, JP Morgan, DBS — and holds maritime licenses and credentials (USCG Chief Mate, Third Mate unlimited tonnage).

Lighthouse is incorporated as a Texas LLC with no disclosed subsidiaries, no public listing, and no venture, private equity, or debt funding rounds on record. Tricon Energy Ltd. functions simultaneously as co-founder, strategic operating partner, and customer, providing an implicit financial and counterparty anchor. Core technology is not disclosed, no AI/ML capabilities are referenced, and the product surface is delivered primarily through human brokers, operations staff, and a recently hired PhD-level Chemical Freight Analyst. Scale signals — four offices, 30-plus enterprise clients, marquee energy and chemical counterparties — indicate a mid-sized boutique brokerage rather than a startup-stage firm, but the absence of disclosed financials means revenue and growth rate cannot be precisely determined from public information.

Name

Lighthouse Chartering

Legal name

Lighthouse Chartering LLC

Website

https://lighthousechartering.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2016

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

Lighthouse Chartering is a privately held Houston-based ship chartering and brokerage firm founded in 2016, operating from offices in Houston, Zurich, Mumbai, and Singapore, serving enterprise clients in the energy, chemical, and logistics sectors on a transaction-fee basis.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Maritime Chartering & Ship Brokerage

NAICS

Support Activities for Water Transportation (4883), Commercial Air, Rail, and Water Transportation Equipment Rental and Leasing (532411)

SIC

Water Transportation (4400)

akta.pro primary industry

Charter Brokerage & Charter Management (Passenger) (THABADAL)

Keywords

• Ship chartering services
• Maritime brokerage
• Tanker chartering
• Freight forwarding
• Chemical shipping logistics

Headquarters

HQ city

Houston

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices4 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure, Technology or R&D

Revenue model

1. Chartering and Brokerage Services: The company earns revenue through chartering ship freight and providing related brokerage services to clients in the energy, chemical, and logistics sectors. Revenue is generated through commissions and fees associated with chartering transactions, market intelligence services, and operations management.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels1 record

Marketing channels5 records

Core offering

Lighthouse Chartering is a ship chartering and brokerage firm that helps enterprise clients in the energy, chemical, and logistics sectors identify and optimize their freight, transport needs, and services in shipping markets. Its core offering combines Chartering (fixture negotiation), Operations (ship/cargo movement tracking and ETA monitoring), Market Intelligence (movement data for decision-making), and Positions (open space and cargo combination identification). Revenue is generated through commissions and fees associated with chartering transactions and related brokerage services.

Product overview

Lighthouse Chartering operates as a ship chartering and brokerage firm offering four integrated services: Chartering (freight optimization), Operations (ship/cargo movement tracking), Market Intelligence (data-driven decision support), and Positions (cargo-space matching). The company was founded in 2016 as a spin-off from Tricon Energy's internal logistics department and serves clients across the energy, chemical, and logistics sectors globally.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Chartering
• Operations
• Market Intelligence
• Positions

Named customers16 records

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Partnerships

One partnership is on record.

• Tricon Energy Ltd.coreStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 April 2016Tricon Energy Ltd. partnered with Mike Loeffel in April 2016 to found Lighthouse Chartering LLC. Tricon serves as both a strategic partner and customer, providing chartering needs that Lighthouse fulfills.

Scale indicators2 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Simpson Spence Young: Tanker-focused shipbroker with deep chemical and product tanker coverage. Directly comparable boutique shipbroker serving oil majors, traders, and chemical companies.
• Braemar ACM (now part of Braemar): Shipbroker and shipping consultancy with strong chemical and product tanker desk. Direct competitor in the chemical/product tanker space where Lighthouse specializes.
• Ifchor Galbraiths: European shipbroker with global tanker and dry cargo desks. Direct competitor to Lighthouse in international ship chartering brokerage; Lighthouse even hired brokers (e.g., Oscar Sekkelsten) from this firm.
• Poten & Partners: US-headquartered shipbroker focused heavily on tankers and energy shipping. Closely comparable to Lighthouse in business model (ship chartering brokerage), customer base (oil majors, traders), and specialty in product/chemical tankers.
• Fearnleys: Norwegian shipbroker and shipping services firm with strong tanker and offshore focus. Comparable to Lighthouse as a relationship-led international shipbroker serving oil, chemical, and product tanker clients.
• Gibson Shipbrokers: UK-based shipbroker with renowned product and chemical tanker practice. Closely comparable specialty shipbroker competing for the same chemical tanker charters.
• EastMed Shipping: Smaller Greek-based shipbroker with chemical/product tanker presence. Comparable niche shipbroker, though more regional in geographic focus than Lighthouse's four-office network.

Broad incumbents

• BRS (Barry Roglund Salles): Large international shipbroker with tanker, dry, LNG and specialized desks. Overlaps with Lighthouse's tanker chartering work but operates at much broader scope and scale across vessel types.
• Maersk Broker: Internal shipbroker of the Maersk group with global tanker/container desk. Competes for chemical tanker and product chartering mandates alongside Lighthouse and serves many of the same cargo owners.
• Clarkson PLC (Clarksons Platou): World's largest shipbroker and shipping services group. Operates Clarksons Platou shipbroking across tankers, dry bulk, containers and offshore — directly overlapping with Lighthouse's chartering brokerage activity, but at significantly larger scale and breadth.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat3 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Facebookfacebook.com/lighthousecharteringllc
• Instagraminstagram.com/lighthouse_chartering
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/lighthouse-chartering-llc

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles14 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Lighthouse Chartering