North America Testing, Inspection and Certification (TIC) Market - Growth, Trends, COVID-19 Impact, and Forecasts (2023-2028)

The North American Testing, Inspection, and Certification Market is expected to register a CAGR of 3.8% over the forecast period. The rise in demand for safety and infrastructure investments in the region is boosting the growth of the studied market. Furthermore, the usage of complex technologies, shorter product lifecycles, and the complexity of supply chains in many end-user industries are driving the growth of the studied market.

Key Highlights

• The advent of new technologies, stringent environmental norms, and increasing health safety measures changed the entire industry's viewpoint on compliance with standards and regulations. Testing, inspection, and certification (TIC) play a significant role in ensuring that the infrastructure, services, and products meet the standards and regulations on safety and quality. Due to the increasing demand for inspection and testing processes at regular intervals across a few industries, such as oil and gas, the market is expected to witness growth, irrespective of the industrial seasonality.
• In addition to imports and exports, rapid technological advancements, which led to product diversity, and in some cases, shorter life cycles, are expected to increase the usage of TIC services. Emerging technological trends, like connected devices (IoT), mobile payments, smart cities, and connected cars, are driving the importance of software testing and inspection, on par with hardware testing and inspection. As these technologies become mainstream, the dependency on TIC services is expected to increase.
• The increasing food safety audits drive the market in countries such as the United States. The Food and Drug Administration Authority (FDA) of the United States introduced the Food Safety Modernization Act to transform the country's food safety system, primarily focusing on preventing foodborne illnesses. Under this act, the government set different standards for various food products. This resulted in rapid growth in the country's tests, inspections, and certification activities.
• The new entrants in the market witness high barriers to entry at the TIC market, which requires more significant investments to grow and operate in the studied region. Some investments include expansion of presence, investments for modern laboratories to match the growing competition and automation trends across industries, and, lastly, investments for stronger industry networks.
• Further, owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, the market witnessed an overall decline in demand. Though revenues decreased in the first quarter of 2020 and last year, a few prominent players saw significantly high demand for testing, inspection, and certification services from select end-user industries. The pandemic has encouraged a shift from traditional on-site testing to remote testing, inspection, and certification. The transition is supported by various organizations, including TIC Council Americas, the Americas' branch of the TIC Council. Further, post-pandemic, vendors like TUV Rheinland introduced remote inspection and virtual assessment to reduce in-person inspection and ensure the health and safety of inspectors.

North America Testing, Inspection & Certification Market Trends

Automotive Industry Holds Significant Market Share

• The recovery in automotive manufacturing and trends like electric vehicles and autonomous cars are some of the significant factors driving the demand for TIC in the North American automotive industry during the coming years. Furthermore, growth in safety technologies such as advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) and vehicles that use sensors, cameras, and laser scanners, among others, would further create massive growth opportunities for the studied market vendors in the coming years.
• Connected cars in the automotive sector are expected to drive the need for TIC services as software, and hardware testing becomes more crucial. In addition, various companies have begun remote services for inspection and testing in the automotive sectors.
• In march this year, Volvo Car UAS launched a program for its US dealers to install automated drive-through vehicle inspection stations to detect structural, mechanical, and tire defects in seconds. Israeli tech company Uveye manufactures the inspection system, and the system is built with artificial intelligence and machine learning to produce valuable reports and mitigate human errors. Therefore, automation is expected to slightly hamper the growth of existing manual TIC services for the market studied. Similarly, according to Uveye tech, the company signed a deal with 15,000 car dealers across the United States in the current year.
• However, the increased adoption of Electric Vehicles across North America is expected to drive the need for TIC services. According to JPMorgan Chase, the battery electric vehicles sold to customers in North America are estimated at some 1.2 million by the next three years.
• As the performance of semiconductors and the adoption of diverse sensors in vehicles continue to increase, the importance of safety standards for software and their level of sophistication has also risen. In february this year, StradVision, an AI-based vision processing technology company for Autonomous Vehicles and ADAS, obtained the ISO 26262 certification for automotive functional safety from TÜV Rheinland, a globally renowned third-party testing, inspection, and certification company.

United States is Expected to Hold Major Market Share

• Due to the increasing demand for inspection and testing processes at regular intervals across a few industries, such as oil and gas, the North America TIC market is expected to witness growth, irrespective of the regional industrial seasonality.
• There is also an increase in the volume of international imports and exports, especially for the products such as food and medical products. The markets of food and beverage, agriculture, consumer electronics, and automotive (electrical vehicles) are expected to provide more scope for TIC services. According to United States Trade Representative, Currently, the United States has 14 free trade agreements with 20 countries.
• Moreover, environment-focused initiatives are also driving the adoption of newer testing standards, primarily with the aid of new technologies. For instance, the Detox campaigns, such as Greenpeace’s ZDHC (Zero Discharge of Hazardous Chemicals) campaign across the U.S. region, primarily aim to reduce the usage of harmful chemical substances in the textile industry (the second largest polluter of freshwater worldwide).
• In the United States, due to the growing competition from newer markets and the increased demand for quality from consumers, quality assurance and compliance solutions have become vital for consumers. Most consumer-based goods and retail services make use of testing and certification.
• In the United States, the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act specifies that the third-party testing and certification of certain products is mandatory before being placed on the market, positively impacting the market’s growth. In December this year, Kiwa, a global Testing, Inspection, and Certification (TIC) company, announced the merger with St. Louis (USA) based ASI LLC to the Kiwa Group. The merger would significantly strengthen Kiwa’s presence in the United States by providing Food, Feed & Farm certifications.
• The increasing adoption of consumer electronics, smart and wireless devices in the sector are also attracting many vendors to offer a range of product certification programs for consumer electronics, smart and wireless devices to help customers meet the industry standards. These programs address various technologies, including Bluetooth SIG, NFC Forum, LoRa Alliance, GCF, and PTCRB for cellular. These certifications are required if products leverage cellular and wireless technologies. According to U.S. Census Bureau and Consumer Technology Association, the forecast released this year anticipated a USD 1.7 billion increase in the sales value of smartphones sold in the United States, for a total of USD 74.7 billion in sales.

North America Testing, Inspection & Certification Market Competitor Analysis

The North America Testing, Inspection, and Certification (TIC) Market is moderately growing with major players like SGS SA, Intertek Group Plc, Bureau Veritas, TUV SUD, and Applus Services, SA, among others. Moreover, Testing, Inspection, and Certification (TIC) are used in various industries to provide vendors with growth opportunities. Players in the market are adopting strategies such as partnerships, innovations, mergers, and acquisitions to enhance their product offerings and gain sustainable competitive advantage.

In November 2022, TUV Rheinland acquired a specialist inspection and verification company Inspection Verification Bureau Ltd (IVB). IVB would provide independent and specialist inspection and verification services to the global gas, renewable energy, oil, and power industries. The acquisition would further strengthen TUV Rheinland’sposition as a full-service provider to the industry with complimentary services, particularly in the voluntary inspection services sector.

In January 2022, SGS announced its collaboration with Microsoft to advance the advanced data solutions and productivity platforms to develop innovative solutions for testing, inspection, and certification for its customers in industries. In addition, the companies aim to personalize the customer experience with the help of IoT and artificial intelligence.

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