Liebherr is a German-Swiss multinational equipment manufacturer based in

Bulle Bulle (; frp, Bulo ) is a municipality in the district of Gruyère in the canton of Fribourg in Switzerland. In January 2006 Bulle incorporated the formerly independent municipality of La Tour-de-Trême. History Ancient times Bulle is first ...

, Switzerland, with its main production facilities and origins in Germany. Liebherr consists of over 130 companies organized into 11 divisions:

earthmoving Earthworks are engineering works created through the processing of parts of the earth's surface involving quantities of soil or unformed rock. Shoring structures An incomplete list of possible temporary or permanent geotechnical shoring structur ...

, mining, mobile cranes, tower cranes, concrete technology,

maritime crane A crane vessel, crane ship or floating crane is a ship with a crane specialized in lifting heavy loads. The largest crane vessels are used for offshore construction. Conventional monohulls are used, but the largest crane vessels are often catam ...

aerospace Aerospace is a term used to collectively refer to the atmosphere and outer space. Aerospace activity is very diverse, with a multitude of commercial, industrial and military applications. Aerospace engineering consists of aeronautics and ast ...

and transportation systems, machine tools and automation systems, domestic appliances, and components. It has a worldwide workforce over 42,000, with nine billion euros in revenue for 2017. By 2007, it was the world's largest crane company. Established in 1949 by Hans Liebherr in Kirchdorf an der Iller,

Baden-Württemberg Baden-Württemberg (; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million inhabitants across a ...

, Germany, the business is still entirely owned by the Liebherr family. Isolde and

Willi Liebherr Willi Liebherr (born in 1947) is a German-Swiss entrepreneur chairman of the board of Liebherr Group. Life and education Willi Liebherr grew up in Upper Swabia's, Kirchdorf an der Iller and in Biberach. He graduated as an engineer from the S ...

, Hans' daughter and son, respectively, are the chief executive and chairman of the Bulle, Switzerland–based Liebherr-International AG, and several other family members are actively involved in corporate management. In 2005, ''

Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine owned by Integrated Whale Media Investments and the Forbes family. Published eight times a year, it features articles on finance, industry, investing, and marketing topics. ''Forbes'' also r ...

'' magazine listed them as

billionaires A billionaire is a person with a net worth of at least one billion (1,000,000,000, i.e., a thousand million) units of a given currency, usually of a major currency such as the United States dollar, euro, or pound sterling. The American busin ...

. In 1974, the

Franklin Institute The Franklin Institute is a science museum and the center of science education and research in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is named after the American scientist and statesman Benjamin Franklin. It houses the Benjamin Franklin National Memori ...

awarded Hans Liebherr the

Frank P. Brown Medal The Frank P. Brown Medal was formerly awarded by the Franklin Institute for excellence in science, engineering, and structures. It was established by the 1938 will of Franklin Pierce Brown, a member of the Master Plumbers Association. The designer ...

History

Hans Liebherr was drafted for military service in World War II. During the war, Liebherr served with the Ulm Pioneer Battalion 101, which was subordinate to the 101st Light Infantry Division and fought under Army Group South in the German-Soviet War. After the war, he started by building affordable tower cranes; Liebherr expanded into making

aircraft An aircraft is a vehicle that is able to flight, fly by gaining support from the Atmosphere of Earth, air. It counters the force of gravity by using either Buoyancy, static lift or by using the Lift (force), dynamic lift of an airfoil, or in ...

parts—it is a significant supplier to European

Airbus Airbus SE (; ; ; ) is a European multinational aerospace corporation. Airbus designs, manufactures and sells civil and military aerospace products worldwide and manufactures aircraft throughout the world. The company has three divisions: '' ...

airplane manufacturer—and commercial chiller displays and freezers, as well as domestic

refrigerator A refrigerator, colloquially fridge, is a commercial and home appliance consisting of a thermally insulated compartment and a heat pump (mechanical, electronic or chemical) that transfers heat from its inside to its external environment so th ...

s. The group also produces some of the world's biggest mining and digging machinery, including loaders,

excavator Excavators are heavy construction equipment consisting of a boom, dipper (or stick), bucket and cab on a rotating platform known as the "house". The house sits atop an undercarriage with tracks or wheels. They are a natural progression fr ...

s, and extreme-sized

dump truck A dump truck, known also as a dumping truck, dump trailer, dumper trailer, dump lorry or dumper lorry or a dumper for short, is used for transporting materials (such as dirt, gravel, or demolition waste) for construction as well as coal. A t ...

s. The T 282 B is the world's second-largest truck (after BelAZ 75710). The group's nine-axle mobile crane, the LTM 11200–9.1—with a telescopic boom—in 2007 received the heavy-lifting industry's Development of the Year award for being the world's most powerful example of such a machine. Over the years, the family business has grown into a group of varied companies, and has locations in many countries, including Germany, Australia, Britain, Ireland, Turkey, and the United States. Since 1958, its Irish factory in

Killarney Killarney ( ; ga, Cill Airne , meaning 'church of sloes') is a town in County Kerry, southwestern Ireland. The town is on the northeastern shore of Lough Leane, part of Killarney National Park, and is home to St Mary's Cathedral, Ross Cast ...

County Kerry County Kerry ( gle, Contae Chiarraí) is a county in Ireland. It is located in the South-West Region and forms part of the province of Munster. It is named after the Ciarraige who lived in part of the present county. The population of the co ...

, has built container cranes, exporting them worldwide through the port of

Fenit Fenit () is a small village in County Kerry, Ireland, located on north side of Tralee Bay about west of Tralee town, just south of the Shannon Estuary. The bay is enclosed from the Atlantic by the Maharee spit which extends northwards from ...

. In Australia, the group in 2013 commenced an AU$65 million expansion of their local headquarters in

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

. The development includes adding a new three-storey office, workshops, warehouse, component plant, and distribution centre to the Para Hills facility. In the U.S., the group in 2012 started spending US$45.4 million (about €34.1 million) on a three-year renovation and expansion of its

Newport News, Virginia Newport News () is an independent city in the U.S. state of Virginia. At the 2020 census, the population was 186,247. Located in the Hampton Roads region, it is the 5th most populous city in Virginia and 140th most populous city in the U ...

, factory, offices, and warehouse. The company sought to increase its production there beyond 100 mining trucks a year. On 19 February 2013, representatives from the Commonwealth of

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth are ...

and the cities of Newport News and Hampton announced that they would make grants and incentives available for transport improvement, training, and property investment. In addition, the Liebherr Group owns six hotels in Ireland, Austria and Germany. In April 2014, Liebherr announced that it would invest €160 million at its production site in Bulle. By 2017, Liebherr had expanded its workforce to 43,869 employees. That same year, the company announced it had achieved the highest turnover in the Group's history, with sales of €9,845 million. In 2018, Liebherr generated a turnover of €10,551 million, breaking through the €10 billion barrier for the first time in the company's history. In March 2020, Liebherr launched their first APAC HQ in Singapore, alongside their bespoke $35,000 SGD Bespoke Luxe Refrigerator with the help of PR & Communication specialist Stanley Kan & his team.

Products

The line of products manufactured by the company includes: *Earth-moving equipment * Mining equipment * Cranes: mobile, crawler, tower, maritime, mobile construction *

Diesel engine The diesel engine, named after Rudolf Diesel, is an internal combustion engine in which ignition of the fuel is caused by the elevated temperature of the air in the cylinder due to mechanical compression; thus, the diesel engine is a so-cal ...

s *Deep foundation machines *Concrete-handling equipment *Material-handling equipment *

Electric motor An electric motor is an electrical machine that converts electrical energy into mechanical energy. Most electric motors operate through the interaction between the motor's magnetic field and electric current in a wire winding to generate f ...

s *Port (container-handling) equipment *

Machine tool A machine tool is a machine for handling or machining metal or other rigid materials, usually by cutting, boring, grinding, shearing, or other forms of deformations. Machine tools employ some sort of tool that does the cutting or shaping. Al ...

s *

Automation Automation describes a wide range of technologies that reduce human intervention in processes, namely by predetermining decision criteria, subprocess relationships, and related actions, as well as embodying those predeterminations in machines ...

systems *Domestic

s and

freezer A refrigerator, colloquially fridge, is a commercial and home appliance consisting of a thermally insulated compartment and a heat pump (mechanical, electronic or chemical) that transfers heat from its inside to its external environment so th ...

s * Aircraft equipment *

Hotel A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. Facilities provided inside a hotel room may range from a modest-quality mattress in a small room to large suites with bigger, higher-quality beds, a dresser, a re ...

s *Mechanical, hydraulic, electrical, and electronic components and subcomponents Liebherr has the world's most powerful and tallest crawler crane in its LR 13000. It is capable of lifting and has a maximum pulley height of . This is achieved with the attachment of an additional lattice jib to the main boom. The height of the crawler chassis is an additional , which gives the lattice structure a total height of . The maximum hoisting height is and the total ballast used is , including of derrick ballast.

Gallery

File:Construction in Sète, Hérault 01.jpg, On the right a Liebherr top-slewing crane of the EC-H Litronic series File:Telescopic crane, SouthGate, Bath.jpg, Liebherr LTM 1500 telescopic crane File:Liebherr T282.jpg, Liebherr T 282 B mining truck File:Liehbherr hydraulic shovel.JPG, Liebherr hydraulic shovel File:Liebherr HS 895 01.jpg, Liebherr HS 895 Hydroseilbagger File:ILA Berlin 2012 PD 144.JPG, Mock-up of the

A350 The Airbus A350 is a long-range, wide-body twin-engine jet airliner developed and produced by Airbus. The first A350 design proposed by Airbus in 2004, in response to the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, would have been a development of the A330 ...

nose gear at ILA 2012 File:Sainte-Souline 16 Liebherr R926 2013.jpg, Liebherr R926 File:Liebherr - Kran LTM 1500-8.1 (a).JPG, Liebherr LTM 1500–8.1 File:Кран с маховой стрелой.jpg, Liebherr-710 HC-L 32/64 Litronic tower crane File:Liebherr, IFA 2018, Berlin (P1070080).jpg, Domestic appliances (mainly refrigerators) File:ILA Berlin 2012 PD 154a.JPG, Airplane air-conditioning unit

References

External links

*
Liebherr Machinery database at portvision.euLiebherr family behind bid for Southampton FC
''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally. It was f ...

'', 18 August 2010.
Craneception: Watch a Crane Lifting a Crane Lifting a Crane Lifting a Crane
{{Authority control Construction equipment manufacturers of Switzerland Mining equipment companies Swiss brands Home appliance manufacturers of Switzerland Manufacturing companies established in 1949 Swiss companies established in 1949 Multinational companies headquartered in Switzerland Aircraft component manufacturers Crane manufacturers Aircraft undercarriage manufacturers Diesel engine manufacturers Engine manufacturers of Switzerland 1949 establishments in Germany Machine tool builders Electric motor manufacturers Pump manufacturers Gas engine manufacturers

History

Products

Gallery

See also

References

External links