Chinese AI dark horse Manus acquired by Meta (META.US) or become Zuckerberg's first "cash cow" in the 600 billion AI infrastructure

Meta Platforms (META.US) has agreed to acquire the technology and core team of the Singaporean artificial intelligence startup Manus. This move will add a popular intelligent personal assistant product to this social media giant's commercialization layout driven by massive AI investments. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has listed AI as the company's top priority, spending billions of dollars on recruiting researchers, building data centers, and developing new models. Manus disclosed an annual recurring revenue of about $125 million earlier this year, providing intelligent services to businesses through a subscription model - this commercialization path may become a key lever for Meta to accelerate recouping its AI research and development costs. It is worth noting that the financial terms of the cooperation between the two parties have not been disclosed to the public. Manus's parent company was originally established in China and later relocated to Singapore. Earlier this year, the company was valued at close to $500 million in a funding round led by American venture capital firm, Benchmark; at the time, Benchmark was criticized by legislators and other venture capitalists for supporting an AI company related to China. Manus released its product earlier this year, an AI personal assistant capable of tasks such as resume screening, trip planning, and simple stock analysis. Meta owns an AI chatbot Siasun Robot&Automation Meta AI, which can be used on social and communication platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp in addition to AI glasses. Meta is making significant investments to compete with rivals such as OpenAI, Google under Alphabet, and Microsoft in the AI competition. Zuckerberg has promised to invest $600 billion in US infrastructure projects over the next three years, with a majority of it being AI-related. The company has assembled a high-cost research team and plans to launch a new cutting-edge AI model next spring; while some investors are concerned that these expenses may not significant revenue in the short term. Meta has only acquired Manus's technology and leadership team, without disclosing how the new team will be integrated internally. Earlier this summer, Meta made a high-profile investment in the startup Scale AI, with Scale AI CEO Alexandr Wang providing AI infrastructure support to Meta in this collaborative form. In a statement on Monday, Meta said it will continue to operate and sell Manus's services while integrating them into its existing products.