Buyer of Schlumberger Frack Unit Now Eyes Lead Over Halliburton

Liberty Oilfield Services Inc., which will become North America’s second-biggest fracking provider with the acquisition of a Schlumberger unit, expects to one day topple Halliburton Co. from the No. 1 spot.

“Customer demand has told us to grow at this pace, and then deals like this come to us,” Liberty Chief Executive Officer Chris Wright said in an interview after the deal was announced on Tuesday. “Our goal with this acquisition is to keep getting better, but to the extent we succeed at that, it probably leads to us being the leader sometime down the road.”

Less than three ...