3M to buy Israeli body tracking firm

Industrial manufacturing giant 3M has announced it will buy Israeli company Attenti Holdings, which markets GPS-based solutions used for monitoring people awaiting trial or on probation, as well as the elderly in aged care facilities.

"This acquisition will position our track and trace business as a leader in the high growth electronic offender monitoring market and add Global Positioning System (GPS) and active Radio Frequency (RF) technology and capability to our portfolio," said Rory Yanchek, general manager, 3M Track and Trace Solutions in a statement.

3M has offered US$230 (AU$248) million in cash to Attenti, which claims to have 340 staff worldwide and operations in Sydney, Australia.

3M's acquisition of body tracking technology follows the $1 billion offer it made for US biometric systems company, Cogent Systems.

Cogent provides 3M an automated fingerprint recognition system.