Mexico, Canada and the United States integrate a circuit that allows a chip to be born with a digital blueprint in Toronto, travel to Guadalajara for testing, return to Texas for another phase and end up installed in a car, an airplane or a server. This coming and going occurs without friction thanks to the T-MEC.
The SIA maintains that any unwise changes would have immediate effects in an industry that does not tolerate disruption, but opens the door to improvements.
Companies need certainty for plants that take years to build and for equipment that costs hundreds of millions of dollars. The association emphasizes that the treaty reduced costs, preserved intellectual property and allowed deep integration in research, design and manufacturing. This architecture turned North America into a block with its own weight in the face of Asian expansion with inducible leadership from the United States.
In 2024, The US registered a surplus of more than 10,000 million dollars with Mexico and almost 800 million with Canada in semiconductor tradeindicate data from the International Trade Commission.
In addition to boosting key U.S. manufacturing sectors, the USMCA provides a valuable platform to solidify U.S. leadership in emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI), by strengthening semiconductor supply chains and promoting open digital trade.
Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA).
Looking ahead to the T-MEC review in 2026, the semiconductor industry has a request: preserve the rules of origin that strengthen American competitiveness and consolidate North American supply chains. The sector proposes that these standards consider the differences between current processes and those planned for the manufacture of different types of chips.
Rules of origin adjusted to the particularities of each segment could be decisive in integrating semiconductors produced in the United States into a broader range of final goods assembled within the region.
But there is also a warning that is gaining weight in regulatory circles. Without common control mechanisms, the USMCA could become a side channel for external actors to filter components from countries with more aggressive industrial policies.
The industry calls for a shield that includes investment review processes, coordination in economic security and surveillance of sensitive flows. For manufacturers, protecting the ecosystem must be as rigorous as protecting a chip’s design.
The digital chapter of the treaty occupies a central place in the letter. The industry believes that the free flow of data allowed North America to maintain design projects with teams distributed across multiple time zones. The creation of an integrated circuit requires a continuous exchange of information that tolerates no restrictions or taxes.
Engineers depend on data that travels hundreds of times during a single project. The Semiconductor Industry Association asks to expand this chapter and incorporate rules on artificial intelligence, cybersecurity and interoperability. Each improvement, he says, sustains the region’s position vis-à-vis Europe and Asia.
The association dedicates a special space to the protection of industrial secrets. The T-MEC established severe sanctions against the theft of designs and the forced disclosure of source code, celebrates these provisions and remembers that technological advantage depends on that legal border, since a leaked design is equivalent to years of lost investment.
While Washington analyzes new tariff measures, the SIA is confident that the review of the treaty will preserve the United States’ leadership in the global competition for semiconductor production and maintain the country as the axis of a strategic industry for the world economy.
“Given the broad consequences of imposing tariffs on semiconductors, semiconductor manufacturing equipment and their components, it is essential to maintain a clear tariff regime for semiconductors and related technologies, including the appropriate treatment of USMCA-compliant products.”
