Costamare Inc. (NYSE:CMRE) is a Marshall Islands corporation and one of the world's leading owners and providers of containerships for charter. Its headquarters are in Athens Greece. Costamare Inc. has 37 years of history in the international shipping industry and a fleet of 56 containerships, with a total capacity of approximately 326,000 twenty foot equivalent units (TEU) including 10 newbuild containerships on order.

The company’s strategy is to time-charter its containerships to a geographically diverse, financially strong and loyal group of leading liner companies. The containerships operate primarily under multi-year time charters and therefore are not subject to the effect of seasonal variations in demand.

The founders of Costamare Inc. have a long history of operating and investing in the shipping industry. The name “Costamare” was first used in the shipping industry in 1975 when Captain Vasileios Constantakopoulos, the father of the company’s chairman and chief executive officer, Konstantinos Constantakopoulos, founded Costamare Shipping Company S.A. (“Costamare Management”) to serve as the manager of the then existing fleet of ships directly or indirectly owned by the Constantakopoulos family

In 2000 it controlled 21 ships, in 2008, 53, dropping back to 43 in 2010. In 2010 it completed a US$159.6 million IPO to fund an expansion of its fleet COSCO Guangzhou is a container ship, and one of the largest currently in service. Owned by Costamare and chartered to COSCO

In October 2011 the MV Rena, which was being operated under charter by MSC, ran aground on the Astrolabe Reef near Tauranga, New Zealand. The resulting oil spill was labelled New Zealand's "worst ever environmental disaster". According to Costamare "the Captain was an experienced Master and had an exemplary record. The ship was fully certified and had been inspected by the Flag State and New Zealand Port State Control (in August and September 2011 respectively). They found no problems. Obviously something went very wrong and the company is cooperating with the Transport Accident Investigation Commission of New Zealand (TAIC) to find the answer"