What’s important: This move highlights how Chinese AI startups are increasingly moving their core operations overseas to take advantage of international markets, and to avoid potential regulatory uncertainty at home. Manus is one of China’s leading generative AI agents, but its product depth and long term monetization are questioned.
DetailsManus responded Tuesday night to Chinese media outlet The Paper by saying that it had adjusted certain teams to improve operational efficiency and would continue to develop its core business. In June, Manus’s head of product Zhang Tao confirmed publicly that the company has already moved its headquarters to Singapore.
The context isManus, launched by the Monica team in March, was marketed as the first general-purpose AI assistant capable of independently planning, executing, and analyzing complex tasks, including report writing, spreadsheet creation and analysis, resume screening and stock analysis. The product was initially launched as an invitation-only beta with invite codes priced at a speculative RMB 10,000 ($ 1,394). This sparked accusations of hype-driven advertising.
- Manus is the parent company of Butterfly Effect PTE. LTD. was incorporated in Singapore on August 20, 2023. Founders Xiao Hong, Ji Yichao and both were born in the 1990s. They have backgrounds in software engineering, and they launched projects such as the Monica AI browser plug-in and the Rasgueado entry method.
- Bloomberg reported in May that Butterfly Effect, Manus’s parent, had raised $75M in a round of venture capital led by US firm Benchmark. The company was valued at $500M. The US Treasury Department is currently reviewing the investment.
- Manus has been moving quickly to establish business partnerships and monetization since its popularity surge. In March, the company announced a strategic partnership with Alibaba’s Qwen Team to build Manus functionality on top of Tongyi open-source models. Manus launched paid plans in the same month. Text-to-video was added in June.
In May, it was reported that Manus’s parent firm was looking to raise $100M at a $1.5B valuation. Manus called the report “severely incorrect” and said it was focusing its efforts on product development and customer experience. Shuang is a Shanghai based tech reporter for Technode.com. She covers AI, tech companies, ecommerce and retail. Find her via e-mail: shuang.jing@technode.com. More by Shuang Jing (19659014)
