Butterfly Effect, the parent company of Chinese AI research institute Manas, announced Thursday in a WeChat post that it has raised more than $500 million. This is the company’s first funding round since Meta was forced to cancel its $2 billion acquisition of the startup.
Boyu Capital and IDG Capital led the funding round, with participation from existing shareholders including Tencent, HSG (formerly Sequoia China), and ZhenFund. The AI company said it will continue to hire at home and abroad.
Manas has not disclosed its valuation, but last month it was reported to be in talks with investors to raise $500 million at a valuation of $4 billion.
Manas, which made headlines last year with its AI agent demo, moved its employees to Singapore in mid-2025 before announcing a $2 billion acquisition deal with Meta in December of the same year. At the time, the startup was said to generate more than $100 million in annual recurring revenue.
In April, Chinese authorities ordered AI start-ups to terminate their contracts amid growing concerns about China losing AI talent and researchers to Western countries.
Manas said in August that he resumed his independent business after his contract with Meta ended, but that he would have to delete some user data as part of the split. According to the report, the company is also considering listing in Hong Kong.
Manas did not respond to TechCrunch’s questions about the company’s valuation.
Manus creates AI products and agents similar to those offered by companies like Cursor, Lovable, and Replit. It offers chatbots and vibe coding tools that allow users to build apps and websites, create designs and presentations, generate videos, and more.
The company recently announced Manus 2.0. This brings a new architecture with new products and features built around a new harness. We also introduced Cue, a standalone app that provides your personal AI agent with its own email address, phone number, digital wallet, and computer. This app allows agents to communicate, process tasks across services, and make payments within user-set limits.
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