❯ Manus Announces Return to Independent Operations as Meta’s $2 Billion Acquisition Nears Full Dismantling

DEAL REVERSALAI agent company Manus told users in a letter Tuesday that it will “soon resume operations as an independent company,” marking the start of the substantive dismantling of Meta’s $2 billion acquisition. China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) ordered the deal rescinded in April, citing foreign-investment regulations; the transaction was announced in December 2025 and closed December 29.

NO SHELTERManus was founded in China in 2022 and later relocated its headquarters to Singapore — a move the industry once regarded as standard practice for dodging regulatory review. The NDRC order has shut that door: as long as the underlying technology and team originate in China, offshore registration does not exempt the deal from approval. Co-founders Xiao Hong and Ji Yichao were asked to travel to Beijing in March to explain the situation, and have since been restricted from leaving the country.

UNWIND DEPTHThe separation has reached the level of concrete operational detail: Meta has cut off Manus employees’ access to its internal data systems and barred its own employees from using Manus tools; user data generated after December 29, 2025 in certain jurisdictions will be deleted. The three founders are reportedly in talks to raise roughly $1 billion in external financing to buy the company back at a valuation matching Meta’s original acquisition price, with a Hong Kong listing the longer-term possibility.

REASSESSFor every Chinese AI company that has shifted its corporate structure to Singapore, this is a costly public demonstration. The most expensive item in cross-border M&A is no longer valuation negotiation — it is the sheer rigidity with which regulators treat a technology’s country of origin as the basis for jurisdiction.

▪ SIGNALAn acquisition that closed eight months ago is being unwound item by item, with the cost shouldered by both buyer and seller — this precedent is far costlier than the $2 billion itself.