New CEO at Ports America

Michael Hassing will hold the top job at the Highstar-owned terminal operator that last year won the bidding for terminal concessions in California and Baltimore.

Ports America, a portfolio company of infrastructure fund manager Highstar Capital, has named a new president and chief executive officer.

The marine terminal operator named Michael Hassing for the job. Hassing previously worked as chief executive officer at Scandlines, a European ferry operator, according to a statement.

Last year, Ports America won the bidding on two public-private partnerships in the ports sector: a long-term lease and financing of the Seagirt Terminal at the Port of Baltimore and a concession on the Port of Oakland’s Outer Harbor Terminal in California.

The latter deal won the company an award recently. The San Francisco Business Times, a local paper, called the Outer Harbor Terminal one of its Real Estate Deals of the Year for 2009.