Manus raises over $500M in first round after Meta deal called off

Chinese AI company Manus, owned by Butterfly Effect, said in a WeChat post on Thursday, October 8, 2026, that it had raised more than $500 million. This is its first funding round since Meta was forced to abandon its $2 billion acquisition of the startup.

The round was led by Boyu Capital and IDG Capital. Existing shareholders also took part: Tencent, HSG (formerly Sequoia China) and ZhenFund. Manus did not disclose the valuation, though a month earlier there were reports of talks to raise $500 million at a $4 billion valuation. The company said it would keep hiring employees at home and abroad.

The startup became known after demonstrating its AI agent last year. In mid-2025 the team moved to Singapore, and in December 2025 the $2 billion deal with Meta was announced. At that point, Manus's annual recurring revenue was above $100 million.

In April, Chinese authorities required that the deal be dissolved amid growing concerns over AI specialists and researchers leaving for the West. In August, Manus resumed independent operations and said that, under the terms of the separation, it had to delete some user data. Manus did not answer TechCrunch's questions about the valuation. According to reports, the company is considering a listing in Hong Kong.

Manus makes AI products and agents similar to those from Cursor, Lovable and Replit: a chatbot and tools for building apps and websites, design, presentations and video. It recently released Manus 2.0 with a new architecture and the Cue app, which gives personal AI agents their own email addresses, phone numbers, digital wallets and computers.

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Translation editor: Салтанов А.