Liebherr will enlarge its maritime crane division factories in Germany and Ireland as part of a major investment in new facilities.

Work on an 8,000 square metre extension to its Rostock factory in Germany has already been completed, with another major enlargement due to follow in 2008. The plant manufactures ship and harbour mobile cranes with tare weights of up to 500 tonnes, along with drilling platform cranes and special-purpose cranes.

In Killarney, Ireland, where large container gantry cranes are produced, a 156 m long, 56 m wide building for cutting and shaping structural steel elements has been commissioned.

The news came at a Liebherr press conference held at its Biberach factory in Germany. Henning Rapp, an executive board member, said Euro500 million would be added this year to the Euro1.3 billion already invested in the group between 2002 and 2006. “It is precisely this level of investment that has put us in a position today to share in the economic boom that many regions of the world and numerous business sectors are currently experiencing,” Rapp said.

As previously reported, construction work is underway at Biberach to create a 7,500 square metre tower crane repair shop. Space freed up in the original building will be used to extend the anti-friction bearing production area. At Leibherr’s mobile crane factory in Ehingen an additional assembly site will be constructed by 2009. In addition a 16,000 square metre final assembly plant for rope excavators, crawler cranes and civil engineering machinery is being erected at the company’s Nenzing site in Austria.