China’s Manus raises over $500M in first funding round since split with Meta

Butterfly Effect, the parent of Chinese AI lab Manus, announced in a WeChat post that it has secured more than $500 million in a funding round led by Boyu Capital and IDG Capital. Existing investors including Tencent, HSG (formerly Sequoia China) and ZhenFund also took part. The company said it will continue hiring domestically and internationally but did not disclose a valuation. Manus became widely known after a viral demo of its AI agent and relocated staff to Singapore in mid-2025. A planned $2 billion acquisition by Meta announced in December was later ordered to be unwound by Chinese authorities amid concerns about losing AI talent and researchers to the West. At the time of the acquisition announcement, Manus was reported to have annual recurring revenue exceeding $100 million. After resuming independent operations in August, Manus said it had to delete some user data as part of the split with Meta. The startup has recently rolled out Manus 2.0, describing a new architecture and accompanying products, and launched Cue, an app that gives personal AI agents dedicated email addresses, phone numbers, digital wallets and virtual computers to manage tasks and payments within user-set limits. TechCrunch reported that Manus was in talks last month to raise $500 million at a reported $4 billion valuation, but the company declined to confirm a valuation when asked. Media coverage also indicated Manus is considering a public listing in Hong Kong, though Butterfly Effect has not provided details in its funding announcement.