Manus raises more than US$500 million after sale to Meta blocked by China

Artificial intelligence startup Manus, whose acquisition by Meta was blocked by China, announced this Thursday (8) that it had completed a fundraising round that raised more than US$500 million (R$2.51 billion).

The announcement comes just weeks after the company, developed in China and based in Singapore, announced that it had resumed its independent operations after separating from the owner of Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram.

Manus offers an AI agent tool capable of performing real-world tasks for users — currently one of the hottest segments in global technology, with AI labs in a race to launch personal assistants.

Butterfly Effect, Manus' parent company, said in a statement that the financing round — the first since its founders and investors repurchased the company from Meta — was led by Boyu Capital and IDG Capital.

Current investors, including Tencent, HSG Capital and ZhenFund, also participated, according to the company.

The company did not reveal its most recent valuation, but press reports indicate that it could be around US$4 billion (R$20.05 billion).

This value would be double the US$2 billion foreseen in the acquisition agreement announced by Manus and Meta in December, which would be one of the largest purchases in the history of the owner of Facebook.

In April, China's economic planning body ordered the agreement to be scrapped, in a move that analysts said signaled the country's desire to exercise greater control over domestically developed technologies.

At the time, Beijing also reportedly restricted the foreign travel of two of Manus' co-founders. In September, the AI ​​company reported having resumed its independent operations after undoing the acquisition by Meta.

That month, the company released a major update to its AI agent tool and a new standalone app called Cue.

Similar to Muse, Meta's new personal agent tool, which has sparked investor enthusiasm as it represents an opportunity to generate revenue beyond advertising, Cue allows users to create their own personal AI agents for tasks such as booking restaurants and making phone calls.

Manus also said it was forming teams to "develop products for the domestic market."

The two co-founders who, according to previous reports, had been blocked from leaving China were spotted at the recent Manus product launch event held in Singapore last month.