March 25 (Reuters) – China has barred two co-founders of artificial intelligence startup Manus from leaving the country as regulators review whether Meta’s $2 billion acquisition of the firm violated investment rules, the Financial Times reported.
Manus’s chief executive Xiao Hong and chief scientist Ji Yichao were summoned to a meeting in Beijing with the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) this month, the FT said on Wednesday, citing people with knowledge of the matter.
Following the meeting, the executives were told they could not leave China due to a regulatory review, though they are free to travel within the country, the report said.
Manus is actively seeking legal and consulting assistance to help resolve the matter, the newspaper said.
“The transaction complied fully with applicable law. We anticipate an appropriate resolution to the inquiry,” a Meta spokesperson told Reuters in an emailed statement.
China’s Ministry of Public Security and Manus did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Meta announced in December that it would acquire Manus, which develops general-purpose AI agents capable of operating as digital employees, performing tasks such as research and automation with minimal prompting.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, but a source told Reuters at the time that the deal valued Manus at $2 billion-$3 billion.
Earlier this year, China’s commerce ministry had said it would assess and investigate Meta’s acquisition of Manus.
(Reporting by Gursimran Kaur in Bengaluru; additional reporting by Preetika Parashuraman, Editing by Mrigank Dhaniwala, Janane Venkatraman and Sumana Nandy)