Manus has secured more than $500 million in new funding, marking its first financing round since China forced the unwinding of Meta’s planned acquisition of the artificial-intelligence startup.
The round was raised by Butterfly Effect, Manus’s parent company, and was led by Boyu Capital and IDG Capital. Existing investors Tencent, HSG — formerly known as Sequoia China — and ZhenFund also participated, according to Decrypt. Butterfly Effect announced the financing in a post on WeChat.
The company did not disclose its valuation or explain in detail how it would use the proceeds. It said it intended to continue hiring both in China and internationally.
From $2 billion acquisition to independent company
Meta announced in December 2025 that it would buy Manus for approximately $2 billion. The transaction was later reviewed by Chinese authorities. On April 27, China’s National Development and Reform Commission ordered that the deal be withdrawn and said foreign investment in Manus would be prohibited in accordance with relevant laws and regulations.
Meta ended its relationship with Manus in June. Manus said in August that it would resume operating independently. As part of the separation from Meta, the company deleted certain user data created on or after December 29, 2025.
The new investment gives Manus fresh capital after a period in which its ownership and operating structure changed significantly. The company has not said whether the funding will support a particular product or expansion plan beyond its statement that it will keep recruiting.
Bloomberg had previously reported that Manus was seeking $500 million at a $4 billion valuation. That figure was not confirmed in the funding announcement, and Butterfly Effect has not disclosed a valuation for the new round.
What Manus builds
Manus develops AI agents, a category of software designed to carry out tasks rather than only respond to a user’s questions. Depending on the assignment, an agent can be directed to perform activities such as booking travel or analyzing stocks. The concept differs from a conventional chatbot because the software is intended to pursue a goal through multiple steps with less direct supervision.
Manus launched in March 2025 and initially operated by invitation. It was presented as a Chinese competitor to OpenAI’s $200-a-month agent. Interest was reportedly intense: invitation codes were listed on a Chinese resale marketplace for as much as 10 million yuan, or more than $1.3 million.
The company has acknowledged that its technology used Anthropic’s Claude and fine-tuned versions of Alibaba’s Qwen models, alongside models developed by Manus itself. About eight months after launch, Manus reported $100 million in annual recurring revenue. That measure represents the annualized value of its subscription revenue at the time, rather than necessarily the cash collected in a single year.
Manus later moved its team to Singapore around the middle of 2025, closed most of its China operations and laid off dozens of employees in July. Its current product lineup includes Cue, an application that gives AI agents their own phone numbers and digital wallets. Payments made through the service are restricted to a budget set by the user.
A crowded and politically sensitive AI market
Manus entered the agent market before major technology companies made autonomous software a central area of competition. The field subsequently drew attention from other developers, including OpenClaw, an open-source agent that runs on a user’s own machine and can receive instructions through applications such as WhatsApp and Telegram.
OpenClaw gained more than 100,000 GitHub stars within weeks of becoming widely known. GitHub stars are bookmarks that developers use to signal interest in a project. OpenAI later hired OpenClaw creator Peter Steinberger to lead its work on personal agents.
Meta also launched its own coding agent, Muse Code, in August, as competition intensified with products including Codex and Claude Code.
The Manus transaction unfolded amid broader efforts by Beijing to manage the international movement of sensitive AI expertise and investment. China’s commerce ministry said in January that it would assess the proposed Meta acquisition. In March, Reuters reported that Manus co-founders Xiao Hong and Ji Yichao had been summoned to Beijing and prevented from leaving the country.
In May, China also required some senior AI employees at private companies, including Alibaba and DeepSeek, to obtain approval before traveling abroad. The Manus case therefore involves more than a failed corporate transaction: it also illustrates the regulatory constraints facing Chinese AI companies as their technology becomes increasingly relevant to competition with US firms.
Moneyiar market picture
Moneyiar data at 11:08–11:09 on October 9, 2026, showed a broadly weaker picture among the listed digital assets:
- Solana (SOL): $109.540838777, down 3.87% over 24 hours and 10.33% over seven days.
- Hyperliquid (HYPE): $85.7345706952, down 0.48% over 24 hours and 6.09% over seven days.
- Monad (MON): $0.0244295781, down 3.97% over 24 hours and 27.92% over seven days.
- Meteora (MET): $0.4182516218, down 13.31% over 24 hours but up 31.69% over seven days.
These figures describe market prices and percentage changes at the stated times and are separate from Manus’s private funding round.
