Opinion: Meta's unwinding of Manus shows even forced deals have merits

Disposal of Chinese agentic AI start-up has left the Facebook owner better off than it might seem.

22. Juli 2026 um 18:00 Uhr / Von Louise Lucas, Financial Times

Manus wowed onlookers when it was launched but is only a wrapper on top of Anthropic's Claude model Bild: CFoto/Sipa USA via Reuters Connect

There's a company in the fast-moving world of AI that is for sale at the same price as the vendor paid a year or so ago. But for Facebook owner Meta, which is in talks to offload Chinese agentic AI start-up Manus, the whole transaction has worked out better than it might appear.

For sure, Meta is a forced seller, unwinding the deal at Beijing's behest. As a buyer, Meta was paying market prices. Its $2bn acquisition price was equivalent to 20 times then-annual recurring revenue of $100mn. That was in line with the value ascribed to Anysphere, maker of vibe-coding agent Cursor, at its fundraising around the same time.