Covestro cutting 900 jobs globally

Leverkusen, Germany - Covestro AG is cutting 900 jobs globally as part of a company-wide cost savings move.

The German speciality chemicals firm announced the cuts 25 Oct as part of its third-quarter earnings release. The move is part of a plan to save €350 million by 2021.

In a news release, Chief Financial Officer Thomas Toepfer said that third quarter results "met our expectations," but added that Covestro "is seeing increasingly challenging economic conditions, and also experienced limited product availability in Europe and Asia in the past quarter."

Officials listed "administrative areas" as a potential category for the job cuts. The cuts represent about 5.5%of Covestro's global head count of 16,200.

A company spokesman said that 400 of the job cuts will take place in Germany. He added that all 900 cuts are expected to be made by 2021.

In the first nine months of 2018, Covestro's sales were up almost 7% to more than €11.3 billion, while profit jumped almost 21% to more than €1.7 billion.

Third-quarter growth, however, was lower, with sales up 5%, but profit up only 1%.

Covestro ranks as a major global producer of polycarbonate, polyurethanes and other specialty plastics and chemical products.