China's Xiaomi-backed Viomi Technology debuts on Nasdaq

NEW YORK - Viomi Technology, a Xiaomi-backed Chinese seller of internet-connected home appliances, debuted on the Nasdaq stock exchange on Tuesday, trading under the ticker symbol of "VIOT."

Viomi priced its initial public offering (IPO) of 11.4 million American Depositary Shares (ADSs) at $9.00 per ADS for a total offering size of roughly $103 million, assuming the underwriters do not exercise their option to purchase additional ADSs.

Each ADS represents three of the company's Class A ordinary shares.

The underwriters for Viomi's IPO include Morgan Stanley and China International Capital Corporation Hong Kong Securities.

Shares of Viomi started trading at $9.50 per share, up 5.56 percent from its IPO price, and rose to $9.66 per share around midday.

Viomi said that the proceeds from the IPO will mainly be used for research and development of products, services and technologies; selling and marketing initiatives; potential strategic investments and acquisitions along the company's product value chain; and general corporate purposes.

Chinese tech giant Xiaomi is Viomi's strategic partner, shareholder and customer, which gives Viomi access to Xiaomi's ecosystem users, market and data resources and related support, Viomi said in its prospectus.

The company's revenues increased 284.4 percent to $157.2 million in the first half of 2018, 62.6 percent of which came from product sales to Xiaomi, said the prospectus.

Xiaomi has 19.5 percent stake in Viomi and indicated interests in subscribing up to a total of $10 million worth of the American Depository Shares in this offering at the IPO price, according to the public filing.

"By listing on the Nasdaq, Viomi hopes to better focus on the development of home appliance technology and further expand brand awareness, as Nasdaq is known as a tech-heavy stock exchange," Xiaoping Chen, co-founder and chief executive officer of Viomi, told Xinhua after the opening bell.

Founded in May 2014, Viomi has developed an IoT @ Home platform, which consists of an ecosystem of innovative IoT-enabled smart home appliances, or IoT products, together with a suite of complementary consumable products and value-added businesses.

IoT, or Internet of Things, refers to the network of physical devices embedded with electronics, software, sensors, and connectivity which enables these things.

According to the iResearch Report, China's home appliances market reached approximately $121 billion in terms of retail sales in 2017, and is estimated to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 7.8 percent from 2017 to 2022 to reach $176.5 billion by 2022.