KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 20 — The Selangor International Business Summit (SIBS) 2023 has garnered RM2.9 billion in investment value on the first day of the event, said Selangor Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Amirudin Shari.

He said the investment value has surpassed the target of RM1.5 billion within two days.

“The memoranda of understanding (MoU) signed between many parties have reached RM2.9 billion, overtaking our target of RM1.5 billion, but it takes time to finalise those agreements,” he told reporters after launching the 8th Selangor Smart City & Digital Economy Convention (SDEC) 2023 today.

SDEC is part of the SIBS 2023, a four-day convention which started yesterday at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre, here.

Meanwhile, for the Selangor Accelerator Programme under SDEC 2023, Amirudin said 20 premier startups from 232 applications will compete to secure their spot among the final 10 and stand a chance to gain insights through a trip to Taiwan this year.

The startups would have the opportunity to pitch in internationally-recognised platforms in the United States including Silicon Valley, which is in the pipeline next year.

“We will ensure that we find quality startups so that they can get matching funding and we will also bring them to the US to enable them to pitch to the big companies (there),” he said.

In his speech earlier, Amirudin said SDEC has grown tremendously since its inception, doubling from 120 to 250 booths, and hosting 120 exhibitors including local and international enterprises involved in various technologies, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and entrepreneurs.

Organised by the Selangor Information Technology & Digital Economy Corporation (Sidec), SDEC is an event gathering industry leaders, startups and SMEs and players from the public and private sectors, to delve into the mechanisms of existing and future smart city and digital economy frameworks and solutions.

The 8th edition of SDEC aims to unlock more opportunities in digitalisation and sustainability revolving around the discussions on environmental, social and governance, startups pitching as well as SME digitalisation. — Bernama