MBRIF welcomes 17 companies into Cohort 12 accelerator programme
The Mohammed Bin Rashid Innovation Fund (MBRIF) has announced the 17 companies forming Cohort 12 of its Innovation Accelerator Program, drawing participants from the UAE and international markets. The cohort spans sectors including artificial intelligence, healthtech, sustainability, advanced manufacturing, and digital infrastructure, reflecting what the fund describes as a broad range of high-potential innovation-led businesses.
The named participants are Albert Health, ByteEdge, DoDocs AI, Emarabot, Eshara AI, Forg3t, GrowthIQ, Qortex, Reputeo, Rewa, SeekRight, Sghartoon, The AM Lab, TYAR AIN, Valeo, WAT, and YU.SH. The MBRIF did not provide individual company descriptions or indicate which specific health-related indications or digital-health applications Albert Health, the sole identifiable healthtech participant, is pursuing.
Programme structure and context
Through the accelerator, cohort members receive tailored mentorship, strategic advisory support, and access to a network of investors and industry partners. The programme is designed to sharpen commercial readiness and support scaling, though MBRIF does not publicly commit to fixed equity stakes or standardised funding tranches for participants, which distinguishes it from some Western accelerator models.
Fatima Yousif Alnaqbi, Acting Assistant Undersecretary for Support Services at the UAE Ministry of Finance and the Ministry's representative at MBRIF, said the programme is focused on "giving founders the practical support, strategic guidance, and ecosystem access they need to strengthen their businesses and scale with confidence."
Since the accelerator launched in December 2018, MBRIF says it has supported nearly 220 businesses, helped them raise in excess of AED 3 billion in external funding, and contributed more than 1,500 jobs across the UAE. The fund is operated by Emirates Development Bank and sits alongside a separate Guarantee Scheme that offers government-backed financing without equity dilution.
Digital health and the Gulf accelerator landscape
The inclusion of healthtech within the cohort reflects a wider regional push to diversify Gulf economies away from hydrocarbons by developing knowledge-based industries. The UAE has set explicit national targets around innovation and advanced technology, and several Ministry-level programmes now channel early-stage support toward health, climate, and AI companies in parallel.
The Gulf accelerator ecosystem has matured considerably over the past five years, with Abu Dhabi, Riyadh, and Dubai all hosting competing programmes from sovereign-backed vehicles. MBRIF's focus on economic-diversification objectives means its cohorts tend to skew toward commercially scalable models rather than deep-science research, which places it in a different lane from university-linked translational programmes found in Europe and North America. For biotech and digital-health investors tracking the region, the practical question is whether UAE-based cohort graduates convert accelerator support into fundable Series A rounds in internationally competitive timeframes. The AED 3 billion cumulative funding figure cited by MBRIF, spread across nearly 220 companies over roughly seven years, implies an average raise of around AED 13.6 million per company, a modest sum by global venture standards but consistent with the seed-to-Series A range typical of emerging-market accelerators.
The next milestone to watch is the formal demo-day or investor showcase MBRIF typically hosts toward the end of each cohort cycle, at which point commercially actionable detail on individual participants, including Albert Health, is likely to emerge.