​Meta’s acquisition of Singapore-based AI startup Manus marks a major step in turning its massive AI infrastructure investments into commercial, revenue-generating products. Manus builds general-purpose autonomous AI agents—“digital employees”—that can handle end-to-end business tasks such as research, workflow automation, data analysis, and basic development, primarily sold to small and mid-sized businesses via subscriptions. Despite being recently launched, Manus reportedly reached an annual revenue run rate of about $125 million, signaling strong market demand.
For Meta, the deal accelerates its shift from an ads-centric company to a platform for AI agents. Manus provides an immediate monetization path, technology that can be integrated across Meta’s ecosystem (Meta AI, WhatsApp, Messenger, Instagram, and business tools), and scalable automation for both internal operations and external customers. This aligns with Mark Zuckerberg’s vision of billions of AI agents—potentially one for every business.
For businesses and creators, the acquisition could make advanced AI agents widely accessible through everyday Meta tools, enabling always-on customer support, automated marketing and ad optimization, and ready-made agent templates for common use cases. Strategically, the deal positions Meta more competitively against OpenAI and Google in the emerging AI agent space, while also raising regulatory considerations around data use, competition, and AI safety.