Almost 400 participants from 165 organisations attended an industry briefing on the progress of the Kuala Lumpur-Singapore High Speed Rail (HSR) project yesterday.

Rolling stock and system suppliers, as well as engineering and legal consultants, were among those who joined the briefing, organised by the Land Transport Authority (LTA) and MyHSR, a unit under the Malaysian Ministry of Finance.

Slated to be completed by end-2026, the 350km Kuala Lumpur-Singapore HSR is expected to cut travel time between the two cities to 90 minutes.

The briefing in Singapore also aimed to encourage companies to form consortia to take part in the tender for the assets company - responsible for designing, building, financing and maintaining all rolling stock and rail assets for the project.

The tender is expected to be called by the fourth quarter of this year.

Further meetings have been scheduled with participants to "facilitate discussions and obtain feedback on the briefing topics", said LTA and MyHSR yesterday.

LTA chief executive Ngien Hoon Ping said he looked forward to receiving "quality bids" for the assets company tender.

MyHSR chief executive Mohd Nur Ismal Mohamed Kamal said: "Other tenders, such as the civil and operating company tenders, will be developed according to the project timeline."

He added that announcements will be made in "due course".

On Monday, six Singapore firms, brought together by IE Singapore, announced their plans to partner each other to take part in high-speed rail projects, beginning with the Kuala Lumpur-Singapore HSR.