Process Control Instrument Manufacturers NAICS 334513

May 5, 2025 - Some Electronic Products Exempted From Tariffs

• Some electronics products imported to the US have been exempted from President Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, according to US Customs and Border Protection. Profit margins of process control instrument manufacturers may be compressed if tariffs are applied to imported manufacturing inputs in the future. The exemption, which comes after the Trump administration imposed a minimum tariff rate of 145% on Chinese goods imported to the US, does not include the 20% tariff on Chinese goods for the country’s alleged role in the fentanyl trade. Various electronic parts are among the exempted products. The exemption applies to products entering the US or removed from warehouses as early as April 5.
• Critical infrastructure systems are vulnerable to a new kind of cyberattack that targets browser-based control systems in industrial facilities with easy-to-deploy, difficult-to-detect malware, according to researchers at Georgia Tech university. The malware targets programmable logic controllers (PLCs), which are increasingly made with embedded webservers and are accessed on site via web browsers. Attackers can exploit this approach and gain full access to infrastructure systems. "We're calling it web-based PLC malware. It gives you full device and physical process control,” said Ryan Pickren, a Ph.D. student in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the lead author of a new study describing the malware and its implications. This new cyberattack strategy is the result of a shift in recent years in software and devices used to control and monitor various industrial systems. Manufacturers have turned to web-based management instead of a dedicated terminal or control pad running custom software specific to the device.

• Process control instrument manufacturers benefiting from reshoring may also benefit from nearshoring, according to the Reshoring Initiative (RI). Harry Moser, founder of RI, says that if a product is so labor intensive that you can’t bring it to the US, then companies are sometimes surprised to find that wages in Mexico are far lower than in China. The average Mexican manufacturing worker earns $4 an hour, while the rate in China — where wages have been gaining 10% to 15% a year — is currently around $7, and in the US, it’s roughly $23. Products coming from Mexico end up with an average 40% US content, while in China they have 5% US content.
• Process control instrument manufactures increased prices moderately during 2024, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Process control instrument manufacturing industry employment decreased slightly and average wages for nonsupervisory employees increased slightly during the first month of 2025, according to the BLS. Process control instrument industry sales are forecast to grow at a 0.27% compounded annual rate from 2024 to 2028, slower than the growth of the overall economy.