Reportedly: Manus AI raises over $500M, Tencent among backers
Reported by Zhidongxi · not yet confirmed by the company or a second independent outlet. We update this page when it is.
Manus AI's parent Butterfly Effect has completed a new funding round of over $500 million (approx. $3.352 billion RMB), Zhidongxi reported. The round was led by Boyu Capital and IDG Capital, with existing investors Tencent, Sequoia China, and ZhenFund participating.
China context
- Original name
- 蝴蝶效应
- Outside China
- Not stated in the sources yet
- Claims
- Company-reported; not yet independently evaluated
- For builders
- Manus 2.0's Cascade framework claims significant efficiency gains; developers outside China may want to test these claims if the model or API becomes available.
- For investors
- The reported $4 billion valuation and backing from major investors signal strong capital interest in Chinese agent startups, but outside-China investors should verify the round's terms and Manus's global expansion plans.
Translated from Chinese. Quotes and facts link to the original sources.
Butterfly Effect, the parent company of Manus AI, announced on October 8, 2026 that it has completed a new funding round exceeding $500 million (approx. $3.352 billion RMB). This is the largest single funding round for a domestic agent-native startup in China. The round was led by Boyu Capital and IDG Capital, with continued support from existing shareholders Tencent, Sequoia China, and ZhenFund. In September 2026, Bloomberg reported that Butterfly Effect planned to raise $500 million at a $4 billion valuation, double its previous $2 billion valuation, which would make it the highest-valued AI agent startup in China. On September 29, 2026, Manus released Manus 2.0 and the multi-agent group chat application Cue, its first major update since resuming independent operations on September 1, 2026. Manus 2.0 uses the self-developed agent framework Cascade, which reduces token consumption by 23.2%, shortens task completion time by 28.2%, and lowers operating costs by 32% compared to the previous system in one test configuration. Butterfly Effect is currently recruiting for 17 positions globally.
Manus 2.0's Cascade framework is designed to keep projects lightweight initially and invoke specialized capabilities only when needed. In a company-reported test configuration, Cascade reduced token consumption by 23.2%, task completion time by 28.2%, and operating costs by 32% compared to Manus's previous system. These figures are company-reported and have not been independently verified.
Butterfly Effect's funding round gives it significant capital to compete with global AI giants like OpenAI and Anthropic, which are integrating agent capabilities into their main products, and with open-source agent projects. The investment reflects a shift in global capital toward agent products that can execute and be deployed, and may pressure other agent startups to demonstrate commercial viability.
The funding provides Butterfly Effect with resources to scale Manus AI and compete in the global agent market. The reported valuation increase from $2 billion to $4 billion indicates strong investor confidence in the company's commercialization potential.
The next verifiable signals are whether Butterfly Effect achieves the reported $4 billion valuation in a disclosed filing, whether Manus 2.0's performance metrics are independently benchmarked, and whether the company expands its global hiring and product availability outside China.