Kai Xiao

Kai Xiao from CICC inquired about the key drivers for Tuya's gross margin expansion, particularly the potential impact of AI-related revenue on the overall margin mix. He also asked about the primary growth engines for the SaaS and Smart Device Solutions segments and their future outlook.

Answer

Co-founder, COO, and CFO Alex Yang stated that gross margin reflects the company's technology value proposition. He expressed satisfaction with the current margin levels: PaaS around 48%, SaaS above 70%, and Smart Solutions above 20%. He noted that the SaaS business is growing faster than PaaS. For Smart Solutions, the strategy is to focus on top-tier customers with differentiated offerings, with new AI solutions like AI toys showing positive initial traction.

Kai Xiao of CICC requested an update on the progress of Tuya's cooperation with Singapore's HDB and inquired about the geographic expansion of Tuya's AI developers, as well as any differences in AI application development between domestic and overseas markets.

Answer

CFO Yi Yang detailed the Singapore HDB project, a centralized energy management platform for 1.4 million public apartments, with initial hardware and platform deployment expected around the end of Q3. He noted this serves as a replicable model for other Southeast Asian markets. Regarding AI developers, Yang described the current phase as an 'educating period' with global demand from key customers. He observed that device-focused technical development is prominent in Mainland China but also present in Korea and Turkey, while software-focused development is more geographically diversified.

Kai Xiao asked about the downstream demand for IoT PaaS, including key growth regions and categories, and the outlook for its gross margin. He also inquired about the potential to expand the high-quality customer base and whether GenAI would aid in this acquisition.

Answer

Co-Founder and CFO Alex Young (Yi Yang) highlighted the diversified and balanced nature of the PaaS business across more than 3,000 categories and multiple global regions, which provides resilience. He noted customer base expansion is coming from non-consumer fields and new spatial solution providers. Young believes that as AI enables more complex spatial solutions for property and asset management, it will open doors to new types of high-quality customers.

Kai Xiao from CICC asked about the growth drivers and future outlook for the accelerating SaaS sector, and requested an update on the monetization strategy and future plans for Generative AI, including any potential revenue contribution.

Answer

CFO Alex Yang explained that SaaS growth is driven by identifying verticals where AIoT can solve pain points, highlighting hospitality, energy management, and logistics as promising areas with standardized solutions being replicated. For AI, she detailed two approaches: integrating AI capabilities directly into hardware to create 'AI devices' like a bird feeder that identifies species, and offering AI software services on top of existing devices, such as generating video stories of a pet's day. She noted these are in pilot stages, with monetization plans expected by early 2025.