Manus, the company behind a general-purpose AI agent, has formally resumed operating as an independent business. Meta bought the company for roughly $2 billion in December 2025, but China's outbound investment security reviewers ordered the transaction reversed, and the integration was taken apart midway. The path from acquisition to independence is a fresh reminder of the constraints Chinese-founded AI startups face when they tie themselves to foreign capital.

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The founding team restarts as an independent agent lab

Manus announced on September 1 that it had returned to independent operations, with the founding team still in charge. Co-founders Xiao Hong and Zhang Tao, along with chief scientist Ji Yichao, continue to lead development of general-purpose AI agents. The company now describes itself as an independent agent lab.

What Manus builds is an agent that takes an instruction, plans the work itself, browses the web, assembles material, and carries a task through multiple steps to a finished result. It is not a chatbot waiting for the next prompt, and that distinction drew attention when the product launched in March 2025.

The separation had consequences for users. Manus had asked customers in certain regions to back up data created on or after December 29, 2025, the day Meta announced the acquisition. Some of that data was deleted as the two companies pulled their systems apart. A restoration portal remains open, with no deadline announced.

From a $500 million valuation to a $2 billion deal and back

Manus grew out of Butterfly Effect, also known as Monica, which was founded in Beijing before moving its headquarters and core engineering to Singapore. In April 2025, Benchmark led a $75 million round (about 12 billion yen) that valued the company at roughly $500 million (about 80 billion yen). Tencent, ZhenFund, and HSG were among the other backers.

Then Meta stepped in. On December 29, 2025, Meta said it had acquired Manus for about $2 billion (roughly 320 billion yen). The plan was to keep Manus available as a standalone product while folding its agent technology into Meta AI and WhatsApp business tools. The valuation had quadrupled in roughly eight months.

On April 27, 2026, the foreign investment security review mechanism housed within China's National Development and Reform Commission prohibited the investment and ordered the deal revoked, citing concerns about the transfer of Chinese technology.

By June, the two companies were unwinding at an operational level. Data sharing stopped, Manus staff lost access to Meta's internal systems, and Meta employees were barred from using Manus for internal work. In August, Manus removed the language on its website describing itself as part of Meta. The September announcement completes the split.

Relocating headquarters did not put the company out of reach

The implications go well beyond one company. Chinese-founded startups have widely assumed that moving headquarters and key operations to Singapore or a similar jurisdiction creates enough distance from China to accept Western capital or agree to an acquisition. Manus shows that the assumption does not always hold.

The more uncomfortable point is that a closed deal can still be undone. The stop order arrived four months after the acquisition was announced, forcing the companies to pry apart a business that had already begun merging. In cross-border M&A, clearing U.S. review is often treated as the finish line, but Beijing retains room to claw a transaction back afterward.

From an investor's perspective, agent companies with Chinese founding teams have effectively lost the cleanest exit into U.S. Big Tech. Capital is likely to flow toward vehicles that stay domestic on each side of the Pacific.

Ownership remains the open question

What has not been disclosed is the shareholding structure after independence. Manus has not explained how the consideration Meta paid was handled, whether earlier investors recovered their stakes, or whether a new funding round is planned.

On the product side, the company says it will continue building general-purpose agents. Competition in that category is expanding quickly, and whether Manus can secure funding on its own while keeping up its development pace looks like the deciding factor from here.

Summary

Manus announced its return to independent operations on September 1. Meta's roughly $2 billion acquisition was revoked by Chinese regulators, and the integration was dismantled over about four months. The founding team remains in charge and will continue developing general-purpose AI agents. The case shows that moving headquarters abroad does not place a company beyond China's investment review, and that a completed deal can still be reversed, which is likely to shape cross-border AI acquisitions going forward.