In a world where sensors manufacturers want to beef up their supply chains across a diverse number of suppliers and also avoiding sourcing from China-based companies, specifically, there are not many alternatives.
In his second term, President Trump has pushed hard for American companies to manufacture goods domestically. Most of the reaction to his push has been around building facilities to make expensive and sophisticated GPUs and other logic chips in the US, and some companies like Apple are pouring billions in US chipmaking operations.
But the Build-in-USA trend is having a significant impact on car companies and car parts makers, primarily because there are so many thousands of small electronics and other parts in a newer model car.
One US-based company in the auto sector hit on a solution to the global supply and trade dilemma. The company, Standard Motor Products, has been making and distributing premium auto replacement parts for the auto aftermarket and custom products for new vehicle and equipment makers for more than 100 years.
On Monday, SMP announced a 50/50 joint venture agreement with a smaller auto sensors manufacturing company based in Thailand, Techstrong Holdings Limited. Terms were not disclosed, but SMP has relied on Techstrong for sensors in the past. The joint venture boosts SMP’s control over development, quality and delivery and is expected to help enhance SMP’s sensor offering. The joint venture is called Techstrong Electronics, also known as SMP Techstrong.
SMP Techstrong supports SMP’s strategy to diversity and strengthen its global supply chain with a highly capable manufacturing facility, SMP said in a statement. “The investment reduces reliance on China while maintaining a presence in a competitive manufacturing region, helping to mitigate risk and improve supply chain resilience,” the company said in a statement.
“By investing in manufacturing and deepening our partnership with Techstrong, we are strengthening our ability to deliver the quality, coverage and value our customers expect from SMP,” said Hap Acee, vice president of Asian operations for SMP.
SMP Techstrong will manufacture ABS speed sensors, camshaft position sensors and other highly technical position sensors, SMP said.
SMP has 6,500 employees and 54 facilities in North America, Europe and Asia. Headquarters re located in Long Island City, New York.
Techstrong is a private company, while SMP is publicly traded on NYSE, where its share price dropped 1.4% early Monday to $37.39. SMP reported first quarter revenues of $451 million, up from $413 million from the same quarter in 2025.