Manus (meaning hand in Latin and person in Marathi) is an autonomous artificial intelligence agent developed by Butterfly Effect Pte Ltd, before being acquired by Meta Platforms.

History

Manus was founded to create artificial intelligence agents capable of operating independently, based on large language models (LLM). The official launch of Manus was on March 6, 2025.

Acquisition by Meta Platforms

In December 2025, Meta announced that it would acquire Manus, the company behind the Manus AI agent. Meta did not disclose financial terms; reporting suggests the deal is valued between US$2-3 billion. Meta said it would continue to operate and sell the Manus service and integrate its technology into products including Meta AI. Manus said it would continue offering subscriptions through its own app and website and remain based in Singapore. In January 2026, it was announced that Manus was the subject of an initial regulatory review by Chinese authorities following the proposed acquisition. The review focuses on whether artificial intelligence technologies developed by Manus while it was based in China fall under national security or technology export regulations. The Chinese government subsequently issued exit bans for Manus executives under scrutiny.

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