Bloomberg reported that Manus, an AI startup founded by China, is planning a funding round of about $500 million, with a target valuation of around $4 billion. This will be its first financing after completing the separation of business operations with Meta Platforms.

Multiple sources said that this funding round is expected to be finalized soon, potentially doubling Manus' valuation and making it the most valuable AI agent startup in China. However, negotiations are still in the early stages, and transaction terms may still change. The identities of potential new investors have not yet been confirmed.

manus

Although the list of new leading institutions has not yet emerged, Manus previously had a strong shareholder base, including Tencent, Sequoia China, and ZhenFund. As of now, representatives from these three institutions have not responded to this matter.

This potential funding comes after Manus ended its partnership with Meta. Bloomberg said that both parties completed the separation of business operations and stopped data sharing in May this year. Manus recently stated that the company has resumed independent operations, led by the founding team, and is developing generative AI agent products for global users. If this $4 billion valuation funding is successfully secured, Manus' position among Chinese AI agent developers will be more stable, and it may also lay the groundwork for an upcoming listing in Hong Kong.

Its competitor Evoken is reportedly raising funds at a valuation of $3 billion, with a product called Lovart, an AI-designed agent. However, Manus still faces broader competition from foundational model providers, as products like Kimi from Moonshot and Claude from Anthropic are becoming increasingly capable in handling general desktop tasks. Unlike these competitors, Manus does not train its own base model from scratch.