Wikipedia Draft:Bahrain Economic Development Board

Bahrain Economic Development Board (EDB) is an investment promotion public agency responsible for bringing foreign investments into Bahrain. The focus is on economic sectors, including financial services, manufacturing, information and communications technology (ICT), tourism, logistics, and transport. EDB was founded in 2000 and it has been chaired by Prince Salman bin Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, Deputy King, Crown Prince of Bahrain, since March 2002.

Overview
Bahrain EDB was founded in October 2000 in collaboration with the Government of Bahrain and other partners. The EDB focuses on several economic sectors that include financial services, ICT, manufacturing, tourism, logistics, transportation, real estate, healthcare, and education.

Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa chairs the Economic Development Board. Khalid Humaidan was announced as the CEO of Bahrain EDB in 2019. Bahrain EDB has offices in multiple countries, including the USA, Japan, and China.

In October 2008, Bahrain EDB launched Bahrain Economic Vision 2030. It outlines the future path for the development of Bahrain's economy, government, and society. It is a long-term plan to grow Bahrain's standard of living, reform the government, education, health sectors, and increase privatization, training, and workforce to establish Bahrain as a regional center for human capital.

In 2017, Bahrain introduced the region's first nationwide cloud policy named Cloud First. As a result, Amazon Web Services launched its first Middle Eastern cloud region in Bahrain in 2019. In March 2021, a Chinese cloud company named Tencent Cloud signed an MoU with Bahrain EDB to build a data center in Bahrain. Tencent will build its first public Internet Data Center (IDC) in Bahrain and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region by the end of 2021.

In 2019, the EDB announced that 134 companies with an investment of $835 million have set up operation in Bahrain. The next year, Bahrain received $885 million in direct investments through new companies setting up and expanding in finance, manufacturing, logistics, education, healthcare, real estate, tourism, and ICT.

United Nations Top Investment Promotion Agency in the Middle East was awarded to Bahrain EDB in 2019 for its role in attracting large-scale investments.

In 2020, the World Economic Forum, in partnership with EDB, launched a new roadmap for cross-border data flows to help global tech-based collaboration.

The country has built the region's first onshore fintech regulatory Sandbox, where more than 32 fintech companies are testing technologies. In October 2020, the Central Bank of Bahrain (CBB), in cooperation with other banks and EDB, announced FinHub 973. The platform is designed to create an ecosystem in the fintech sector to establish investment opportunities in the region.