Commerce's International Trade Administration announced a slate of levies on the machinery, which are also known as mobile access equipment and are used on construction sites and industrial settings to elevate workers and equipment.

Named respondents Lingong Group Jinan Heavy Machinery Co. Ltd. and Zhejiang Dingli Machinery Co. Ltd. will face rates of 165.3% and 31.7%, respectively. A China-wide entity will be tagged with a 165.3% rate and all separate-rate companies will face margins of 51.83%.

The duties are slated to take effect in April, if the U.S. International Trade Commission reaffirms a preliminary finding that unfairly priced imports threaten American companies.

Spawned by a request from domestic companies calling themselves the Coalition of American Manufacturers of Mobile Access Equipment, the parallel probes by Commerce and the ITC are investigating CAMMAE's accusations that Chinese competitors benefited from illegal subsidies and flooded the U.S. market with their products at unfairly low prices.

Commerce had preliminarily tagged Lingong Group with a dumping margin of 275.06% and Zhejiang Dingli with a dumping margin of 17.78% in September. Lingong — and subsequently the China-wide entity — faced a steeper rate because the company did not respond to Commerce's requests for information, prompting the agency to apply adverse facts available.

The agency revisited 12 separate issues raised after its preliminary anti-dumping investigation results were published, according to the Issues and Decision Memorandum the ITA released Tuesday.

In response to comments, Commerce revised surrogate values for a number of inputs used by Zhejiang Dingli, including fabricated steel components and aluminum products, and Lingong Group, including cylinders, ladders and counterweights. Commerce also decided to use ocean freight rates supplied by Maersk over data from other logistics companies relied on in the preliminary calculations.

Tim Brightbill, counsel to CAMMAE, cheered the determination in a statement shared with Law360, adding that the anti-dumping margins on top of the previous subsidy determination are needed to preserve competitive conditions for American manufacturers.

"Even while this case has been pending, we've seen Chinese producers continuing to increase their production capacity and to target the U.S. market," Brightbill said. "So the cases are extremely important for leveling the playing field."

Steep countervailing tariffs on Chinese lifts went into effect in November. Several Chinese companies refused to answer inquiries about their use of certain subsidy programs during the investigation, spurring Commerce to apply adverse facts available when calculating duties as high as 448%.

CAMMAE filed suit over the lower final duties assigned to Lingong Group and Zhejiang Dingli, assigned though the companies were allegedly unable to prove they didn't benefit from China Export-Import Bank's Export Buyer's Credit Program.

Counsel for Zhejiang Dingli and Lingong Group did not respond to requests for comment Tuesday.

CAMMAE is represented by Laura El-Sabaawi, Timothy Brightbill, Jeffrey O. Frank, Theodore P. Brackemyre and Claire M. Webster of Wiley Rein LLP.

Zhejiang Dingli is represented by Ned H. Marshak, Max F. Schutzman, Dharmendra N. Choudhary and Eve Q. Wang of Grunfeld Desiderio Lebowitz Silverman & Klestadt LLP.

Lingong Group is represented by Michael P. House, Andrew Caridas, Shuaiqi Yuan and Caroline Bisk of Perkins Coie LLP.

The investigation is Antidumping Duty Investigation of Mobile Access Equipment and Subassemblies Thereof from China, investigation number A-570-139, in the U.S. International Trade Administration.

Source: Law360