PPG recently announced that its board of directors has approved significant and broad restructuring actions to reduce its global cost structure. The actions reportedly are focused on certain regions and end-use markets where business conditions are weakest, and they are targeting structural reductions in operation, functional, and administrative costs. 

“Because of continued slow overall growth in global demand, we are taking decisive action to adjust our cost structure,” said Michael H. McGarry, chairman and CEO. “These measures will better align our resources with anticipated ongoing business conditions and will keep PPG competitive in the end markets in which we participate. Even with this broad effort to reduce our total costs, we remain committed to continued investment in growth-related initiatives and in geographies with continued growth potential.” 

PPG will record a pretax restructuring charge of $190-200 million, or $.53-.58 per diluted share, in the fourth quarter 2016, of which approximately $140 million represents cash costs and $50-60 million is related to the write-down of certain assets and other non-cash costs. Of the approximately $140 million total cash outlay, about $110 million is expected in 2017, with the balance to occur in 2018. In addition to the aforementioned pretax charge and cash costs, approximately $15 million of incremental restructuring-related cash costs are expected during 2017 for certain items that are required to be expensed on an as-incurred basis. 

When completed, the company expects the restructuring actions to generate $120-130 million in annual savings, with $40-50 million of savings projected to be realized in 2017 and the remainder of the expected annual savings to be substantially realized by the end of 2018. 

For more information, visit www.ppg.com.