Meta just bought one of the fastest-growing AI startups you’ve probably never heard of

In a year defined by companies pouring shocking sums of money into AI, one more deal squeaked in just before 2026.

Meta just made a play on Manus, the buzzy Singapore-based company with Chinese roots that turned heads earlier this year when it showed its AI agents executing complex tasks, like hunting for real estate and sorting through resumes. 

The deal is sure to turn heads too. Manus and its parent company Butterfly Effect are now based in Singapore but were founded in China – a country with a fraught relationship to the U.S tech industry – and maintain operations there. Facebook’s parent company will reportedly pay more than $2 billion to acquire the startup, which it hopes will bolster its own lagging AI capabilities.

In a crowded field of soaring chipmakers, nimble startups laser focused on AI, and ancient tech giants like Microsoft making themselves freshly relevant with big AI bets, Meta is far from leading the pack – a fact the company seems well aware of.

The acquisition will bring the startup’s agentic AI tech on board, allowing Meta to potentially integrate it into its vast suite of products, including Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Meta’s AI chatbot. The Manus deal follows Meta’s $14.3 billion investment in AI training data startup Scale AI earlier this year.

“Joining Meta allows us to build on a stronger, more sustainable foundation without changing how Manus works or how decisions are made,” Manus CEO Xiao Hong said in a blog post announcing the news.

Meta’s (latest) course correction

Meta’s AI spending spree is only accelerating. After renaming itself Meta and declaring itself all in on the metaverse less than five years ago, Meta abandoned its course – and its massive investments – to play catch up on AI. Mark Zuckerberg declared last month that Meta plans to invest a mind boggling $600 billion into U.S. AI tech and infrastructure by 2028.

Meta Chief AI Officer Alexandr Wang, formerly of ScaleAI, welcomed the Manus team into the fold Tuesday in a post on X. “Excited to announce that @ManusAI has joined Meta to help us build amazing AI products!” Wang wrote, adding that the Meta Superintelligence Labs team will be hiring in Singapore. “The Manus team in Singapore are world class at exploring the capability overhang of today’s models to scaffold powerful agents.”

Manus is no DeepSeek, but the company is still notable as a prominent Asian AI company coming under the wing of an American tech giant. In April, Manus raised $75 million in a round of funding led by San Francisco venture firm Benchmark. The startup is also backed by Asian investors, including Chinese tech conglomerate Tencent and HongShan Capital Group, previously the China-focused wing of American venture capital firm Sequoia, which frequently invests in Chinese startups.

Meta told Fast Company that it plans to “wind down” Manus business operations that continue in China. That process will include relocating remaining Manus employees and severing any Chinese business entanglements. The company also emphasized that Manus employees joining Meta won’t have access to first party user data from Meta’s existing products.

“Meta’s acquisition of Manus AI will enable us to provide the most advanced technology to our users with safeguards in place to eliminate areas of potential risk,” a Meta spokesperson told Fast Company. “There will be no continuing Chinese ownership interests in Manus AI following the transaction, and Manus AI will discontinue its services and operations in China.”