In March 2025, the general AI Agent product Manus burst onto the scene, with invitation codes reportedly being scalped for 100,000 yuan apiece. Nine months later, Meta bought it for $2 billion. Another seven months on: Tencent led a Chinese consortium to buy back 100% of Manus from Meta — at the exact same price.
This is no ordinary corporate acquisition. A Chinese AI product, after a whirlwind rise, offshore relocation, US buyout, and a Chinese regulatory veto, is now being "redeemed" by Tencent at its original valuation — a meticulously calculated strategic move in the AI agent arena.
From a "10‑Day Whirlwind Deal" to a Regulatory Ban
Manus' story began in March 2025. A demo video went viral overnight, and the concept of a "general‑purpose AI agent" instantly captured the tech world's imagination.
Just eight months after launch, its annual recurring revenue (ARR) surpassed $100 million, setting a new growth record for AI startups. Within a month, it secured a $75 million Series B led by Benchmark, pushing its valuation to $500 million.
But just as it gained momentum, Manus made a surprising move: in June 2025, it relocated HQ to Singapore, blocked domestic IP, and cut ties with China. In December, Mark Zuckerberg personally drove the talks, and the deal — from first contact to signing — took only about 10 days, with Meta acquiring Manus for roughly $2 billion.
However, the transaction hit a roadblock in April 2026. China's investment security review office officially banned the deal, ruling that Manus' core technology originated in China and had not been properly declared, and ordered the transaction unwound. This marked the first public prohibition since China's Foreign Investment Security Review Measures took effect.
Tencent's AI Chess Game: from "Betting on the Six Dragons" to "Securing Manus"
Manus is not Tencent's first AI move. Over the past year, Tencent has quietly built a broad investment portfolio. In LLMs, it has taken stakes in five of the "AI Six Dragons" — Zhipu, MiniMax, Moonshot, Baichuan, and StepFun.
By May 2026, three top LLM firms closed over $10 billion in financing within three days. Tencent's cumulative investment in Moonshot and Zhipu alone has exceeded $500 million. In June, it put $20 million into a new lab founded by Alibaba's former Qwen lead, at a $2 billion valuation.
The biggest bet: DeepSeek. In June 2026, DeepSeek raised over 51 billion yuan in its first external round, with Tencent contributing about 10 billion yuan to become its largest outside investor.
Alongside its in‑house Hunyuan model, Tencent now covers nearly all major Chinese LLM players via a "self‑developed + external ecosystem" dual strategy. But unlike earlier minority financial investments, Tencent is pursuing strategic control in Manus — making it a core pillar of its agent strategy, not just another portfolio piece.
Revenue Quadrupled in Six Months, Tencent's $2 Billion "Buyback"
After the ban, Meta completed the separation and data severance. But unwinding left a problem: early investors had already distributed M&A proceeds to LPs and refused to return them.
A new plan emerged: Tencent leads, with Sequoia China and ZhenFund joining, to buy back 100% of Manus at Meta's original $2 billion price, while Benchmark exits.
Financially, it makes sense — at the time of Meta's acquisition, Manus' annualized revenue was $100 million; after six months under Meta's traffic and ads, it jumped to $400‑500 million, a four‑ to fivefold increase. At that scale, the $2 billion buyback is a bargain for a high‑growth engine.
More importantly, Tencent moves from a follower to the lead — becoming Manus' single largest shareholder.
Tencent's "Shrimp Farming" Strategy and the Agent Puzzle
Why would Tencent spend $2 billion to take back a product that once "left"? Pony Ma's recent remarks offer a clue. At the annual meeting, he admitted "we were slow." At the May shareholder meeting, he said: "A year ago we thought we were on board, but that ship was leaking. Now we're on, but we can't sit comfortably — we need more speed."
Entering 2026, Tencent accelerated: open‑sourcing Hunyuan Hy3, launching four self‑developed Agents (QClaw, WorkBuddy, CodeBuddy, QbotClaw), and promoting an open "Shrimp Farming" AI ecosystem.
But Tencent still lacked a globally validated, autonomous general‑purpose agent capable of multi‑step planning and cross‑platform execution.
Manus fills that execution‑layer gap — it can embed into WeChat for consumer automation, enhance enterprise MaaS solutions, and bring millions of overseas users with a mature monetization system, aligning perfectly with Tencent's global expansion.
Independent Operations, Targeting a Hong Kong IPO
Notably, Tencent will not take a controlling stake — Manus remains independent. The plan is to restructure as a Sino‑foreign joint venture registered in China, with dollar‑denominated capital, and aim for a standalone Hong Kong IPO.
In 16 months, Manus went from viral sensation to US acquisition, to regulatory veto, to domestic buyback — at the same valuation, with three owners. For Tencent, the $2 billion buys not just a product, but a market‑proven agent "puzzle piece." Together with its holdings in Zhipu, MiniMax, Moonshot, DeepSeek, and others, Tencent is now securing its position across the full AI landscape.
(For informational purposes only; not investment advice)