The smart plug or light bulb you bought on sale may run on software from a company you have never heard of. Tuya, based in Hangzhou, sold appliance makers a ready-made kit: a chip module, a cloud, and an app. A factory could make an ordinary product smart without building its own software team. When Tuya went public in New York in March 2021, it raised $915 million and its stock rose 19 percent on day one.

Smart Homes, Sold Wholesale

Wang Xueji founded Tuya in Hangzhou in 2014. The bet was that thousands of small brands wanted smart products and had no engineers to build the software. Tuya did the hard part once and rented it to all of them. Its platform ran lights, plugs, cameras, and vacuums for brands around the world. The company earned money on modules and on software that makers paid for each year.

Two Listings, Two Cities

Tuya priced at $21 a share on March 17, 2021, above its range, and began trading on the New York Stock Exchange under TUYA. The stock later fell far below its offer price as Chinese tech stocks slumped. In July 2022 Tuya added a second primary listing on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. It trades in both cities today, under TUYA in New York and 2391 in Hong Kong.

Cover: Lamp with Hanging Head Dragonfly Shade and Mosaic and Turtleback Base, Clara Driscoll. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for a lamp (the connected home).