{"id":18426,"date":"2026-04-27T13:43:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T13:43:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/18426\/"},"modified":"2026-04-27T13:43:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T13:43:11","slug":"china-blocks-meta-from-buying-manus-amid-ai-tensions-with-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/18426\/","title":{"rendered":"China blocks Meta from buying Manus amid AI tensions with US"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The<\/p>\n

The logo of Meta is seen during the Viva Technology conference in Paris, France, 12 June, 2025. (Reuters)<\/p>\n

China<\/a> has blocked Meta<\/a>\u2019s attempt to buy one of the world\u2019s most high-profile artificial intelligence startups<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The unwinding of the $2 billion acquisition of Manus, which is based in Singapore but was founded in China, comes as Chinese authorities attempt to prevent US firms from taking local talent and intellectual property.<\/p>\n

The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) said on Monday it would \u201cprohibit foreign investment in Manus in accordance with laws and regulations, and requires the parties involved to withdraw the acquisition transaction.\u201d<\/p>\n

Manus first gained global attention last year after its researchers claimed to have developed the \u201cworld\u2019s first\u201d fully autonomous AI agent<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The general-purpose AI<\/a> was designed to carry out a variety of tasks independently, from booking holidays to developing video games.<\/p>\n

Manus co-founder Yichao Ji described it as \u201cthe next evolution of AI\u201d when he first shared a demo video of its abilities last March.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis isn\u2019t just another chatbot or workflow, it\u2019s a truly autonomous agent that bridges the gap between conception and execution,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere other AI stops at generating ideas, Manus delivers results… We see it as the next paradigm of human-machine collaboration, and potentially a glimpse into AGI (artificial general intelligence).\u201d<\/p>\n

Within a week of its unveiling it had attracted a waiting list of more than 2 million people.<\/p>\n

Victor Mustar, the head of product at the AI platform Hugging Face and an early user of Manus, described it as \u201cmind blowing\u201d in its capabilities.<\/p>\n

\u201cGot access and it\u2019s true… Manus is the most impressive AI tool I\u2019ve ever tried,\u201d he wrote on X<\/a>. \u201cThe user experience is what so many others promised… but this time it just works.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, announced last December that it would be supercharging its AI ambitions by purchasing Manus for a reported $2 billion.<\/p>\n

\u201cJoining Meta is the logical next step in our journey to scale world-class AI products,\u201d Manus CEO Xiao Hong said in a statement shared with The Independent at the time.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy partnering with Meta’s existing teams, we can integrate Manus’s technology across a global AI portfolio, bringing our autonomous agent capabilities to millions of businesses and creators.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last month, Mr Ji and fellow co-founder Xiao Hong were blocked from leaving China while regulators reviewed Meta\u2019s acquisition.<\/p>\n

Meta said at the time that the acquisition \u201ccomplied fully with applicable law\u201d.<\/p>\n

The Independent has reached out to Meta for comment on whether it plans to contest Monday\u2019s NDRC ruling.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The logo of Meta is seen during the Viva Technology conference in Paris, France, 12 June, 2025. (Reuters)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":18427,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[6744,3013,25,12632,387,12965,13270,13269],"class_list":{"0":"post-18426","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-agi","8":"tag-agi","9":"tag-artificial-general-intelligence","10":"tag-artificial-intelligence","11":"tag-autonomous-agent","12":"tag-china","13":"tag-manus","14":"tag-ndrc","15":"tag-the-national-development-and-reform-commission"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18426"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18426\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}