Annual Report 2021
Highest turnover in the history of the product segment
The entire earthmoving industry recovered after the pandemic-related downturn in the previous year. In line with the industry trend, the earthmoving product segment grew strongly, achieving record sales in the 2021 business year. The European Union is traditionally the most important market for the segment. Here, sales were up, primarily in Germany, France and Italy. There was also strong growth in North America, especially in Canada and the USA. Sales also increased in Central and South America. In non-EU countries, Liebherr increased sales in Russia and the United Kingdom. The same was true in Asia and Oceania, including the countries Indonesia and Australia. Only Africa and the Near and Middle East saw a decline in sales.
Digitalisation and sustainability are crucial topics in the construction industry. That is why Liebherr has launched numerous innovation projects, continually developing its earthmoving range to stay one step ahead of the competition.
A year of new products and technologies
Liebherr unveiled many new products and technologies in the earthmoving product segment in 2021. In the crawler excavator product area, two new electric machines for mining and quarry applications were introduced: the R 976-E and the R 980 SME-E. Liebherr also delivered its first hydraulic excavator with a factory-installed machine control system from Leica Geosystems. In the wheel loader product area, the new L 504 Compact was added to the compact loader series. To ensure safe construction site operation, additional functions were also added to the active personnel detection system, an innovative assistance system available for select Liebherr wheel loaders. Following the digital launch of the new TA 230 Litronic articulated dump truck at the end of 2020, sales took off in Europe. Its innovative engineering and design earned it the Red Dot Award and the German Design Award. In the attachments product area, Liebherr released a new product: the Liebherr Tilt Unit “LiTiU”. This innovative attachment increases the tilt angle of mobile and crawler excavators, enabling them to perform even more types of tasks. In addition, the fully automatic quick-change system LIKUFIX® was made compatible with even more wheel loaders.
Research and development over the past year focused on digitalisation and sustainability topics. As part of its digitalisation strategy, the product segment pushed ahead with development projects focusing on intelligently networked machines, as well as digital solutions and business models. Other projects and measures focused intensively on the goal of achieving carbon neutrality.
Despite the tensions in the procurement market, Liebherr has a positive outlook for the earthmoving product segment in 2022. In addition to causing a devastating humanitarian crisis, the conflict causes grave concerns for the state of the global economy. It is still too soon to tell how the war and the sanctions against Russia will affect the activities of the Liebherr Group directly. Due to these uncertainties, it is impossible to make any reliable forecasts at present.