AkzoNobel has agreed to sell its decorative paints businesses across Southeast Asia, Australia and Papua New Guinea to Nippon Paint for $1.35 billion.
The sale covers operations in Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Papua New Guinea and Australia. Those businesses generated $291 million in revenue and $65 million in EBITDA in 2025, with an EBITDA margin of about 22%.
The price comes with two ways of describing the arithmetic. AkzoNobel said it values the business at 21 times 2025 EBITDA, while Nippon Paint put the purchase price at about 16 times projected 2026 EBITDA.
AkzoNobel expects about $1 billion in net cash proceeds after tax and payments to minority partners. Nippon Paint will finance the acquisition with cash and bank borrowings, rather than new shares.
For Nippon Paint, the attraction lies partly in the machinery behind the paint tins. It sees room for savings from joint procurement, manufacturing and logistics, as well as cross-selling and lower overhead.
Indonesia is due to close separately in late 2026. The transactions covering Vietnam, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Papua New Guinea and Australia are expected to complete around mid-2027, subject to regulatory approvals.
The agreement follows a broader contest for AkzoNobel's decorative paints business. Nippon Paint had previously sought to acquire the entire business, but AkzoNobel rejected proposals that valued it at about €7.5 billion.
Nippon Paint and Sherwin-Williams also abandoned a joint attempt to acquire AkzoNobel's entire company earlier this year.
Greg Poux-Guillaume, AkzoNobel's chief executive, has said the company is narrowing its business to areas where it can achieve differentiating scale. The company has already sold decorative paints units in India and Pakistan.
AkzoNobel announced its planned merger with Axalta, a US coatings maker, in November last year. Its next big priority is that planned merger.
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