China Agrees to Cut Tariffs on U.S. Medical Devices

The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit took place on November 10-11, 2014 in Beijing. At the summit, President Barack Obama announced that the U.S. and China have reached an agreement to expand the Information Technology Agreement, which eliminates all taxes and tariffs on information technology goods specified within the Agreement. The expanded Agreement will cover additional products, including medical devices that are currently imposed with 8% tariff rates.

For more than a year, China had refused to cut tariffs on products that would benefit U.S. companies in order to encourage the growth of its domestic industries. This recent turn of events signals a breakthrough for US.-China negotiations and a positive development for U.S. medical device companies. A White House fact sheet predicts that the expansion to the Agreement will cut tariffs on approximately $1 trillion in annual global sales of technology products, $100 billion of which currently come from the U.S.