Manus: the AI agent bought for $2 billion, then handed back its independence
Idriss Laouali Abdou
Co-founder Karatou Academy · AI Capacity Builder
In late December 2025, Meta (Facebook) bought Manus for around $2 billion. Not for yet another chatbot. For an agent. But on 27 April 2026, China, through the NDRC, ordered the deal to be unwound on national security grounds, a first for an already completed acquisition. Since June 2026, Meta has been dismantling the tie-up: data sharing stopped and systems separated. So Manus is no longer a Meta tool.
The difference? ChatGPT answers your questions. Manus, on the other hand, goes to work. You give it a mission, it executes it on its own while you do something else.
It's one of the tools I demo in my in-person training. Here's how to give it your first mission.
Chatbot vs agent: the difference that changes everything
A chatbot (ChatGPT)
You ask a question. It answers. You ask the next one. It answers. YOU drive every step, from start to finish.
An agent (Manus)
You give a mission and the expected result. It plans the steps, browses the web, reads, compiles, structures. And it delivers the final result. On its own.
💡Concrete example: 'Find the 10 best scholarships for African students, compare them and make me a table with the deadlines.' You close your laptop. You come back. The table is ready.
What you can hand off to it
The research you keep putting off
Price comparisons, schools, suppliers, tools. It browses, compiles and structures while you move forward on something else.
Reports to compile
Give it the sources and the expected format: it assembles the document.
Monitoring your field
The news in your field, opportunities (scholarships, tenders, funding), summarized and organized.
Repetitive web tasks
Collecting information across multiple sites, filling in tables, preparing summaries.
Your first mission in 3 steps
- 1
Create your account
Go to manus.im. Start with the free or trial plan to test it with a real mission.
- 2
Describe your mission with the expected result
The golden rule: specify the DELIVERABLE, not just the topic. Bad: 'find info about scholarships'. Good: 'find the 10 best scholarships for African students, compare them in a table with amount, deadline and application link'.
- 3
Let it work, then check
Manus works autonomously, it can take several minutes. At the end, check its deliverable: sources, figures, links. An agent is a collaborator, not an authority.
What this $2 billion saga tells us
A $2 billion acquisition, then a state-ordered unwinding: that does not happen for a trivial tool. Autonomous agents have become a strategic issue, on par with chips or data.
For you, the essentials do not change: Manus is still a powerful autonomous AI agent, available today. Those who already know how to work with agents (giving a clear mission, checking a deliverable, iterating) will be ahead. This skill is being built right now.
My tips to get started right
- Start with a mission where you already know part of the answer: you'll be able to judge the quality of the deliverable
- One mission = one precise deliverable. Vague missions give vague results
- ALWAYS check the sources and figures in the deliverable before using it
- Don't give it confidential data or passwords
- Keep your best mission phrasings: it's your personal library
Frequently asked questions
Prompts to copy and get started
Analyze your social media
Tu es mon analyste réseaux sociaux. Voici l'export de mes stats en pièce jointe. Analyse mes 5 meilleurs et 5 pires contenus, mes tendances, mes meilleurs créneaux, et donne-moi 3 recommandations. Sortie : un tableau de bord web clair avec un plan d'action. Reste factuel, n'invente rien.
Large-scale research (Wide Research)
Analyse ces 100 concurrents (ou outils, ou comptes de ma niche) et fais-moi un tableau comparatif complet : positionnement, prix, points forts. Traite-les tous avec le même niveau de détail.
Build a complete website
Fais la recherche, le design et construis-moi un site web d'une page, fini et publiable, sur mon sujet. Choisis la structure et les visuels, puis livre-moi le lien.
Automate a weekly report
Programme ça : chaque lundi, refais ce rapport à partir du nouvel export que je te donne, et compare-le à la semaine dernière.