Flight MH370, a Boeing 777, was carrying 227 passengers and 12 crew when it vanished en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing in 2014 in one of the world's greatest aviation mysteries.
The decision will enable commencement of seabed search operations in a new location estimated to cover 15,000 sq km in the southern Indian Ocean, based on a "no find, no fee" principle, minister Loke Siew Fook said.
Ocean Infinity will receive 70 million USD if the wreckage is successfully located, he said. A ship that will look for the missing plane was deployed to its Indian Ocean search zone late last month.
It was not immediately clear how long the search contract with Ocean Infinity would be. Loke had previously said it would cover an 18-month period.
