LF and its role in the North African market. Interview with CEO Massimo Labruna

LF was founded in 2020 to approach the North African market for on-road, off-road, marine and power generation applications. They chose to be the official distributors of FPT Industrial products from the very first days of the company. Today LF’s customers can count on a competent and professional sales and service network in Cape Verde, Senegal, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Lybia, Egypt, Israel and Lebanon with 18 assistance points.

LF is fully owned by AS Labruna and for this reason all the best practices have been transferred and adopted by LF, especially the digitalization of service processes with telematic and remote master connection. We deepened our knowledge of LF’s activities with Massimo Labruna, CEO of AS Labruna and LF.

LF, which was present at the DPE in Rimini, had to cancel its presence at the MEE in Dubai due to the well-known storm. With which communication channels do you intend to raise awareness throughout the Mediterranean area?

“We operate in the Mediterranean area in Phygital mode. We cover the territories with our people who currently speak Arabic and who are in that area every month. Furthermore, we strengthen communication with social media and web marketing tools. This type of approach keeps the face-to-face relationship combined with the digital channel 24/7.”

What is the health status of power generation? In the North African market, how much demand is there for diesel units for prime power and TLC? 

“The power generation market is growing, especially in Algeria, Egypt and Lebanon. In Algeria the generator market is linked to agriculture, to support Pivot installations. In Egypt and Lebanon it is mandatory to have a generator due to frequent blackouts.”

What are FPT’s most popular engine series for PG in your commercial area?

“Today the 6-cylinder NEF series is the market leader, but the demand for larger displacements and therefore for Cursor 13 and Cursor 16 is growing.”

Do you also cover Turkey and Lebanon? OEMs in those countries are still in full swing, aren’t they?

“We cover Lebanon, which is a market with many OEMs. They also export to foreign territories and today the market is 3,000 engines.”

What are the demands in the sub-Saharan region in terms of services related to oil extraction? Morocco is experiencing an expansion of its attractiveness for European industries. Is energy production in that country still mainly linked to generators?

“The Moroccan generator market is closely linked to Chinese and Turkish products. Electric energy furniture is stable and the market is low in the country, but it is growing in quantity because Morocco has many tariff-free agreements with sub-Saharan and African countries and therefore the export share of generators is very high.”

Motor pumps are a vibrant application. What are LF’s targets? I mean, which OEMs and which markets, in particular?

“LF is pushing the motor pump market in Algeria, Egypt and Israel. In these countries there are some OEMs, especially in the fire-fighting sector with the sprinkler market. We are developing UL Listed and FM approved motor versions according to NFPA 13 which is the standard used in this area.”

For this type of application you now have an additional weapon: the R24. What do you think about it? It could also be suitable for sprinkler applications. After all, Bimotor has gained a good market share also relying on Raywin motors. How do you think you will approach the sprinkler market?

“The R24 in the North African market suffers the loss of the European preferential origin but it is a very reliable engine with the special FPT Industrial fuel injection system.”