Meta to acquire Singapore-based AI start-up Manus, said to be for $2.56 billion

San Francisco – Meta Platforms has agreed to acquire Singapore-based artificial intelligence (AI) start-up Manus, adding a popular AI agent as the tech giant works to build a business around its massive AI investment.

Meta is closing the deal with Manus at more than US$2 billion (S$2.56 billion), The Wall Street Journal said, citing people familiar with the matter. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Tech giants such as Meta have been stepping up AI investments through acquisitions and talent hires to stay competitive.

Earlier in 2025, the Facebook owner invested in Scale AI in a deal valuing the data-labelling firm at US$29 billion and bringing its 28-year-old chief executive, Mr Alexandr Wang, into Meta’s orbit.

Manus is among a wave of Chinese tech firms that have set up in Singapore to avoid potential disruption from US-China tensions.

Its Chinese parent, Beijing Butterfly Effect Technology, raised money earlier in 2025 at close to a US$500 million valuation in an investment round led by US venture capital firm Benchmark. Benchmark was criticised at the time by lawmakers and other venture investors for backing an AI company with ties to China.

Manus, which had an annual revenue run rate of US$125 million earlier in 2025, sells an AI agent to businesses via a subscription service, which could give Meta a more immediate return on some of its AI investment. The AI agent acts like a digital employee, completing tasks such as research and automation with minimal prompting.

Manus released its AI agent earlier in 2025, saying it outperformed OpenAI’s DeepResearch. It marketed its product by completing dozens of tasks for users on social media platform X for free. 

AI agents are tools that do not need human supervision to perform specific digital tasks. Enterprise software companies such as Salesforce and ServiceNow have heavily promoted their versions of agents as the most effective way for businesses to use the emerging technology, rather than generative AI features such as chatbots, which require user prompts.

Meta said it will continue to operate and sell Manus’ service, and will integrate the start-up’s agents into its consumer and business products, including Meta AI.

Meta is acquiring the technology and leadership group from Manus, although the companies did not say where the new team will sit within the organisation. Mr Wang, now Meta’s chief AI officer, posted on X welcoming the Manus team to Meta.

Manus co-founder and CEO Xiao Hong, in his own post, said that the deal will help his company expand the reach of its agents.

“The era of AI that doesn’t just talk, but acts, creates and delivers, is only beginning,” he wrote. “And now, we get to build it at a scale we never could have imagined.”

Meta is spending aggressively to compete in the AI race against rivals like OpenAI, Microsoft and Alphabet’s Google. Its CEO Mark Zuckerberg has pledged to spend US$600 billion on US infrastructure projects over the next three years, many of them expected to be AI-related.

The company has also hired an expensive team of researchers to develop a new state-of-the-art AI model it plans to debut next spring, and has faced some scepticism from investors who worry that Meta’s spending will not result in meaningful revenue any time soon. BLOOMBERG, REUTERS