Horizon Robotics lists in Hong Kong in the year's largest tech IPO there

Background

Horizon Robotics is a Chinese company that supplies smart-driving solutions to carmakers. In his speech at the listing ceremony, Yu Kai said the company was founded in 2015 and that after nine years it had become the preferred smart-driving partner for many Chinese carmakers ^[1]. At the end of September 2024, its solutions had been adopted by 27 OEMs across 42 brands, with 290 models designated and 152 models in series production ^[2].

OEM here means the carmaker that assembles and sells the finished vehicle; Horizon sits a step back in the supply chain and supplies technology that the carmaker builds into its own models. A "designated" model is one that has chosen to use the solution, while a model "in series production" is one that is actually being manufactured and sold with it. The gap between the two numbers — 290 designated, 152 in production — is the pipeline of work already agreed but not yet shipping.

The listing

Trading in the shares began on the main board of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange at 9:30 a.m. on 24 October 2024 ^[1]. The shares had been sold to investors at HK$3.99 each, raising HK$5.407 billion ^[2].

That sale is the part of a listing that happens before any ticker appears. The company and its advisers settle on a fixed offer price; investors subscribe at that price; the money raised goes to the company. Only afterwards does the stock trade freely, and from then on its price is set by buyers and sellers on the exchange rather than by the company. So the offer price is a starting reference point, not a market verdict.

The National Business Daily reported that the Hong Kong Stock Exchange's disclosure on 23 October made this the largest technology IPO in Hong Kong that year ^[2]. In other words, among the technology companies that came to the Hong Kong market in that period, none raised more.

The first day of trading

The stock opened at HK$5.12, 28.32 percent above the issue price ^[2]. It closed its first day at HK$4.100 ^[2].

Read together, the two numbers describe a shape familiar from many first days: strong demand at the open, then a partial retreat. The opening price is the first price at which buyers and sellers actually met in the market, and it usually reflects how much unmet demand was left over from the offer. The closing price is where the stock settled after a full session of trading. A buyer who received shares at the offer price was still ahead at the close; a buyer who paid the opening price was not.

The business behind the listing

Horizon's revenue was 467 million yuan in 2021, 906 million in 2022 and 1.552 billion in 2023 ^[2]. The figures roughly doubled in the first of those years and grew by more than half again in the second, which is the kind of trajectory a company points to when it asks public investors to value it on future growth rather than present profit.

The customer numbers give the same picture from a different angle. Being used by 27 OEMs across 42 brands means the company is not dependent on a single carmaker's product cycle — a common risk for suppliers in the automotive industry, where a model that sells badly can take its suppliers down with it.

Why it matters

Yu Kai described the Hong Kong listing as a critical step towards international expansion ^[1]. A Hong Kong listing puts a mainland company in front of an international investor base and gives it a market where its shares are priced and traded in Hong Kong dollars, which is part of what makes an overseas push easier to finance and easier to explain to partners outside China.

The listing also mattered for the market itself. Being described as the year's largest technology IPO in Hong Kong gave it a symbolic weight beyond the money raised: it was one of the year's clearest tests of how much appetite public investors had for Chinese technology companies in the smart-driving field.