Bringing startups up to speed with business practices in South-East Asia, Malaysian Global Innovation and Creativity Center (MaGIC) will be picking out startups in India for its four month-long accelerator programme.

This is MaGIC’s first stop in India as the Malaysian Ministry of Finance backed programme looks to attract entrepreneurs from the ASEAN region to the programme.

In a joint session with Hyderabad based Anthill Ventures and Singapore-based collaborative investment platform Fundnel, MaGIC will handpick two to three start-ups for its first cohort in 2016 from a session at the T-Hub in Hyderabad.

“This year we will run two cohorts for the accelerator programme and it is not necessary for the start-ups to incorporate in Malaysia. We are looking at Malaysia as a centre for starting up business in the ASEAN regions. We are also sounding out companies from Australia and Taiwan this year for the accelerator programme,” said Jonathan Lee, Executive Director of Entrepreneurship Development at MaGIC.

He added that around 27% of the startups from its first cohort after inception in 2015 have raised a seed-round and of the 52 incubated, 30 were from countries other than Malaysia. “Doing business in South East Asia needs localisation for each country, something we can provide to entrepreneurs and companies entering the region,” said Lee.

Source: The Economic Times