In a bid to diversify the company's offering beyond its current appliance recycling and retail capabilities, Appliance Recycling Centers of America has acquired GeoTraq, a manufacturer of a cellular tracking module designed specifically for the Internet of Things (IoT) market.

GeoTraq manufactures a cellular tracking module designed to enable low cost, long-range communication between IoT devices (endpoints) deployed worldwide. The GeoTraq cellular module is claimed to be the world's smallest cellular tracking device. It is also a module that allows wireless device integrators to design and manufacture low cost, long range IoT products for the commercial, industrial and consumer markets. The GeoTraq acquisition allows ARCA the ability to deploy IoT devices to locate, monitor and track the movement of inventory and other assets.

"As we have previously announced, we believe that expanding our offerings beyond our current business model will be highly valuable for shareholders, and therefore we will continue to seek such opportunities to enhance our product and service offerings,"  ARCA CEO Tony Isaac said in a statement. “The addition of the GeoTraq technology increases our offerings as we enter the IoT market.  We believe this acquisition will benefit our overall efficiency and provide GeoTraq access to a large base of new customers."

According to various publicly available sources, the estimated worldwide market for the Internet of Things (IoT) is expected to reach $1.29 trillion by 2020, with the majority spent on hardware, followed by services, software and connectivity. Further, according to these same sources, hardware spending may approach $400 billion by 2020, with modules and sensors connecting endpoints to networks likely representing the bulk of hardware purchases.

"Since the founding of GeoTraq, our mission has been to provide an alternative to the wireless technologies currently used in IoT such as Bluetooth, LoRa, ZigBee, LPWAN and NB-IOT," GeoTraq CEo and President Gregg Sullivan said in a statement. "We are excited to join the ARCA team and to further enhance shareholder value through our unique and exciting product offering."