Schneider Electric SE is nearing an agreement to acquire Shelly Group SE, a maker of smart home devices, according to people familiar with the matter. The French industrial technology firm may announce an offer as soon as this week.

Schneider has been discussing an offer of about €70 a share, valuing Bulgaria-based Shelly Group at around €1.27 billion ($1.45 billion) excluding debt. Shelly's biggest investors are co-founders Dimitar Stoyanov Dimitrov and Svetlin Iliev Todorov. Shares are traded in Frankfurt and Sofia.

Shelly operates in the Internet of Things market, offering smart sensors, lighting, and intelligent wall plugs. A deal fits Schneider Electric's plans to boost smart home revenue. Schneider already runs an IoT platform called EcoStruxure deployed at roughly 480,000 sites across healthcare, leisure, retail and other sectors. Bloomberg News first reported the talks in July.