Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) lab Manus, through its parent company Butterfly Effect, announced on Thursday that it has raised over $500 million. This marks the company's first funding round since Meta's $2 billion acquisition of the startup was cancelled.
The funding round was led by Boyu Capital and IDG Capital. Existing shareholders, including Tencent, HSG (formerly Sequoia China), and ZhenFund, also participated. Manus stated it plans to continue hiring staff both domestically and internationally.
The company did not disclose its current valuation, though it was reportedly in discussions last month with investors to raise $500 million at a $4 billion valuation. Manus had relocated staff to Singapore in mid-2025 before the acquisition deal with Meta was announced in December of that year.
In April, Chinese authorities mandated the unwinding of the deal, citing increasing concerns within China about the loss of AI talent and researchers to Western entities. Manus resumed independent operations in August following the termination of the Meta deal and was required to delete some user data as part of the separation. The company is also reportedly considering a public listing in Hong Kong.
Manus develops AI products and agents, including a chatbot and vibe-coding tools for app and website creation, design, presentations, and video generation. The company recently launched Manus 2.0, featuring a new architecture, and introduced Cue, a standalone app that provides personal AI agents with email addresses, phone numbers, digital wallets, and computers, enabling them to communicate, manage tasks, and make payments within user-defined limits.