China’s national planner made the call on Monday. meta This is to unwind its $2 billion acquisition of Manas, a Singaporean AI startup with Chinese roots.
The National Development and Reform Commission said in a short statement that the decision to ban foreign investment in Manus was taken in accordance with laws and regulations. It added that it had requested the parties involved to withdraw from the acquisition transaction.
CNBC has reached out to Mehta for comment. Shares were down 0.2% in pre-market trading.
The deal had drawn scrutiny from both China and Washington, as U.S. lawmakers have barred U.S. investors from directly supporting Chinese AI companies. Meanwhile, the Chinese government is stepping up efforts to prevent Chinese AI founders from moving their businesses overseas.
Beijing’s interference in the deal raised alarm among domestic tech founders and venture capitalists who had hoped to take advantage of the so-called “Singapore washing” model, in which companies move from China to the city-state to avoid scrutiny from Beijing and Washington.
Manas was founded in China and later moved to Singapore. The company develops general-purpose AI agents, and last March launched the first general-purpose AI agent that can perform complex tasks such as market research, coding, and data analysis. With this release, the startup was hailed as the next DeepSeek.
Manas announced in December, eight months after launching the product, that it had surpassed $100 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR), making it the world’s fastest startup to reach this milestone from $0 at the time.
The company raised $75 million in a round led by U.S. VC Benchmark in April last year.
When Meta announced the partnership late last year, the tech giant said it would accelerate AI innovation for enterprises and look to integrate advanced automation into consumer and enterprise products, including the Meta AI assistant.
However, China’s Ministry of Commerce announced in January that it would conduct an evaluation and investigation into how the acquisition complies with laws on export control, technology import and export, and foreign investment.
A Meta spokesperson told CNBC in March that the company’s acquisition was “in full compliance with applicable law” and the team expected “an appropriate resolution to the investigation.”
—CNBC’s Anniek Bao and Dylan Butts contributed to this article.
