Jim Wilson / New York Times / November 2021 January
A visitor visits the Meta sign in Menlo Park, California.
Meta Inc. announced Monday that it will acquire Manas, an artificial intelligence startup founded in China, as the tech giant accelerates efforts to integrate advanced AI across its platforms.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, but a person with direct knowledge of the matter said the deal would value the Singapore-based company at between $2 billion and $3 billion.
Manas did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Manus went viral on X earlier this year after releasing what it claims is the world's first general-purpose AI agent that can autonomously make decisions and perform tasks with far fewer prompts than AI chatbots like ChatGPT and DeepSeek.
For this reason, commentators have dubbed it China's next deep seek, and Chinese state television has cheered it on. A few months later, the company moved its headquarters from China to Singapore, joining a wave of other Chinese companies that have done so to limit risks from U.S.-China tensions.
“Surveillance is almost guaranteed,” said Jeremy Goldman, senior director at eMarketer. “Anything that has Chinese roots and has 'AI' in the headline now strikes a reflex in Washington.”
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Manus' product is not available in China, but it claims its AI agent's performance outperforms that of OpenAI's DeepResearch. We also have a strategic partnership with Alibaba to collaborate on AI models.
The company said Meta will operate and sell the Manus service and integrate it into consumer and business products, including Meta AI.
“We believe it is a natural fit for Meta's rapidly growing WhatsApp SMB footprint, including its expansion into CEO Mark Zuckerberg's agent-rich personal AI vision,” said Barton Crockett, an analyst at Rosenblatt Securities.
Tech giants like Meta are ramping up their investments in AI through strategic acquisitions and talent hires to survive intense industry competition.
Earlier this year, Facebook's owner invested in Scale AI, valuing the data labeling startup at $29 billion and bringing in 28-year-old CEO Alexander Wang.
Manas raised $75 million this year at a valuation of about $500 million, with support from parent company Beijing Butterfly Effect Technology, sources said, corroborating previous media reports. US venture firm Benchmark led the funding round.
The company's investors also include HSG, formerly known as Sequoia Capital China, ZhenFund and internet giant Tencent Holdings, according to PitchBook data.
