Meta Platforms buys Manus to bolster its agentic AI skillset – News

Meta Platforms Inc. is pushing into autonomous artificial intelligence agents with the acquisition of Singapore-based Manus, which made headlines when it first emerged earlier this year for its ability to perform tasks using a web browser without human supervision.

Manus shot to fame in March, just weeks after China’s DeepSeek Ltd. shocked the world with its low-cost alternative to OpenAI Group PBC’s ChatGPT. It was one of the first AI agents to be made widely available to everyday users through a subscription service, and it made a huge splash on social media for its ability to perform complicated tasks such as creating resumes, writing software applications and designing and building websites.

It also demonstrated impressive research capabilities. In one video posted on X, a user asked Manus to find them a suitable two-bedroom apartment in their desired location and it immediately set about generating a comprehensive list of available real estate, complete with evaluations of local crime rates and commute times to different parts of the city.

Manus was one of the first in a wave of AI agents that have taken the enterprise world by storm this year, and nowadays they’re pretty common as everyone has jumped onto the bandwagon in an effort to fulfill the promise of AI work automation. For instance, coding agents like CodeGPT, GitHub Copilot, Replit and Jules have transformed software development, while companies such as Salesforce Inc. and ServiceNow Inc. have launched fleets of AI agents designed to automate work across industry verticals.

Manus is much more of a general-purpose agent, and although the headlines have since died down, it has reportedly built on its initial success after raising $75 million in funding in April. In a brief blog post announcing today’s acquisition, Meta said Manus has processed more than 147 trillion tokens this year and created over 80 million virtual computers while serving “millions of users and businesses” globally.

The startup, which was initially based in China before moving to Singapore in the summer, says it reached $100 million in annually recurring revenue just eight months after its launch, making it the first startup anywhere to achieve this milestone in such a rapid timeframe. Most of its revenue stems from paid subscribers.

In its announcement, Meta said it will continue to operate and sell the Manus agent as a separate offering for the time being, while also integrating its technology into its own ecosystem, including its Meta AI platform. That could expand the reach of Manus’s technology to billions of users globally.

“Joining Meta allows us to build on a stronger, more sustainable foundation without changing how Manus works or how decisions are made,” said Manus Chief Executive Xiao Hong.

The deal suggests Meta is getting more serious about the need to build a viable business around its massive, multibillion dollar investments in AI infrastructure. AI has become the top priority of Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, surpassing his ambitions for the metaverse, but the social media giant has struggled recently, with its Llama family of large language models perceived to have fallen behind rivals such as OpenAI’s GPT-5 and Google LLC’s Gemini 3.

Zuckerberg responded by forming a dedicated AI research division called Meta Superintelligence Labs that’s focused on building more advanced models and AI agents. The unit is led by Alexandr Wang, the founder of data labelling startup Scale AI Inc. Meta paid $14 billion to acquire a 49% stake in Scale AI earlier this year in what was effectively an “acquihire” for Wang’s services.

Image: Manus