You know you have a powerful tech platform on your hands when hundreds of companies around the world jump on board – before it’s even finished.

In this case, some of the most powerful names in tech are already designing their products to work with a new system called Matter.

That’s the name of a specification program for smart home technology, a market that is growing at more than 21% a year.

In fact, the sector is set to quadruple through 2028 to be worth $380 billion, according to Fortune Business Insights.

And I’ve uncovered a storied tech leader that has worked on this connectivity tech for more than a decade.

It’s set to double its earnings in as little as three years and also pays a 2.8% dividend…

Systems Didn’t Talk to Each Other until Now

The world needs a standard set of specifications for smart home technology.

When it comes to controlling your lights or thermostat from your phone, Apple Inc. (AAPL), Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN), and Alphabet Inc. (GOOGL) have all released their own platforms and devices.

That’s been great, allowing people to choose the platforms they like the best form a variety of interfaces, form factors, and the like.

The problem is that none of these platforms can understand each other.

If one part of your smart-home setup is made by Google, and the other by Apple, you have to switch apps and sometimes even devices to control your home.

And some parts of your setup simply won’t be able to react to others.

For example, you may be unable to have your lights and heating turn on automatically when you unlock your door, or when your motion sensors detect you’ve come home.

It all depends on who made each device, and which platforms it’s compatible with. It’s a pain for folks who want to mix and match devices – cameras, toasters, light switches, windows blinds, garage doors, etc.

It’s hard for any one company to write an interface for so many different standards and devices.

That’s exactly where Matter comes in. Think of it as a common language that will allow all new, and many older, smart home devices to talk to each other.

Regardless of which smart-home platform and voice assistant you choose to use, Matter will allow it to talk to all your smart-home devices, regardless of who made them and platform they run on.

Even better, Matter will work its magic behind the scenes. It will seamlessly bridge different devices, standards, and platforms to allow your smart-home setup to be complete, compatible with whatever you choose to add to it, and, well, smart.

There’s no question that Matter, the brainchild of the Connectivity Standards Alliance, is badly needed.

A new report from ABI Research says more than 100 million devices embedded with Matter will ship this year, with the number hitting 5.5 billion by the end of the decade.

That’s because Matter is backed by all the big players in the smart-home industry, including Apple, Amazon, Google, and some 220 other companies.

This Company Is the Solution

None of this would be possible without Texas Instruments (TXN), which has been a member of the Connectivity Standards Alliance for over a decade.

Texas Instruments, of course, is a legendary company in the computer chip business. It launched the world’s first commercial silicon transistor in 1954, paving the way for the move away from the huge vacuum tubes.

Four years later, the integrated circuit – which is the basis for all of today’s electronics – was invented at Texas Instruments.

Today, the firm is the world ‘s largest maker of analog chips, which are often used to convert real-world signals such as sound and temperature into digital signals.

You ‘ll find these chips in a broad range of industries. Power supplies, mobile phones and other telecom equipment gear, cars, aerospace systems and more couldn ‘t function without them.

The same is true of smart-home devices, which require analog chips to communicate wirelessly with each other, to detect when people enter rooms, to monitor temperature or sunlight levels, and so on.

And as an early member of the Connectivity Standards Alliance and an early booster of Matter, it’s no wonder that Texas Instruments already has a whole slew of chips that support the new standard.

With Matter set to be released later this year, that’s going to be a big catalyst for Texas Instruments.

But you won’t have to wait for that to make some money off Texas Instruments. The firm is very shareholder friendly, and in 2000 launched a dividend that has risen every year since.

Now, that doesn’t mean the firm is starving itself of future growth. Far from it. Texas Instruments spends around 25% of its adjusted earnings on research & development, and grows that spending by about 10% per year.

Another 33% of profits goes towards its robust and growing dividend. If the firm keeps that up, it will join the exclusive club of dividend aristocrats in 2025.

That makes this a great time to look at Texas Instruments because the market is really looking for yield right now amid all the recent volatility.

In its most recent earnings report, the company said earnings grew by 26%. If that growth rate holds, it could double in three years.

And remember, Texas Instruments is paying you a nice yield so you can keep growing the value of your portfolio for the long haul.

Cheers and good investing,

— Michael A. Robinson

Source: Strategic Tech Investor