13.11.2006

Liebherr confirms €6 billion

Liebherr has said that its revenues for the first nine months of 2006 are €4.6 billion an increase of 20 percent on the same period in 2005.

Announcing the results at a press conference in Dubai today, Henning Rapp, a member of the executive board of Liebherr International, said that the company is certain to exceed revenues of €6 billion for the first time, an increase of €800 million or 15 percent on 2005, He added “this might well be exceeded”
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Henning Rapp of Liebherr

Rapp also said that every division of the group is set to post double digit growth and that the effect on net earnings will be very positive.

The key driver of this growth continues to be the construction sector; growth has been limited though by production capacity constraints, in terms of both facility utilisation and availability of certain raw materials.

In order to add capacity it has invested over €400 million in its facilities, a good deal of which is aimed at increasing production capacity. The investment has been funded from cash flow.

In the mobile crane market Liebherr shipped 673 cranes in the first six months of 2006, giving it a 45 percent share of the All Terrain market, up from just under 42 percent in 2005, according to Hans Georg Frey chief executive of Liebherr Ehingen.

The company expects to ship a total of 1,400 cranes for the full 12 month period, a 25 percent jump on 2005 and an increase of over 50 percent since 2003.

Liebherr is currently looking at an order book for its mobile cranes of well over 12 months.

Vertikal Comment

We forecast that Liebherr would exceed €6 billion back in August, When, publicly, the company itself was taking a slightly more conservative view.

The key to it breaking the €7 billion level in 2007 looks as though it will be purely down to production limitations, which were already tight at the start of this year.

The company has done well to increase its mobile crane shipments by over 25 percent, when only 18 months ago it thought it was nearing absolute capacity.

The €400 million investment in new facilities is probably a little lean, given that it is group wide and also includes sales and distribution facilities.

See Liebherr August 2006