China is sending a warning to US tech firms: Don't poach our AI talent and tech

• China is probing Meta's acquisition of Manus, the startup behind a "general-purpose" AI agent.
• The probe highlights China's efforts to retain AI talent and technology amid US tech interest.
• The move also appears aimed at curbing "Singapore washing."

China has a message for US tech firms: Hands off our AI talent and tech.

That's what Beijing is signalling by announcing a probe into Meta's acquisition of Manus, analysts told Business Insider.

The probe, confirmed by China's Ministry of Commerce in a Thursday press conference, will investigate whether the acquisition complies with the country's laws and regulations concerning export controls, according to a statement translated by Google.

Manus was launched in China last March by the AI product studio Butterfly Effect and drew global attention after saying it had designed a "general-purpose" AI agent that can conduct tasks with limited human supervision. In mid-2025, the startup relocated to Singapore.

In December, Meta announced that it would acquire Manus and sever its ties with China completely. The deal reportedly exceeds $2 billion. Meta did not respond to a request for comment for this story from Business Insider.

While China and the US have long engaged in tit-for-tat regulatory exchanges involving their tech companies, analysts told Business Insider this probe is notable because it appears to be aimed at discouraging so-called "Singapore washing" — the process of moving a company from China to Singapore to reduce regulatory scrutiny.

TikTok's parent company, ByteDance, and fast-fashion giant Shein are among those that have shifted their headquarters from China to Singapore.

The probe is also a means to discourage Chinese AI startups from choosing the US, analysts said.

"I see Beijing's probe as an effort to prevent the loss of AI technology and talent to foreign acquisition, especially to the US," Wendy Chang, a senior analyst at the Mercator Institute for China Studies, told Business Insider.

Meta said it plans to bring over Manus' top leadership and will continue to run its AI agent platform separately, alongside integrating the technology into Meta's own products.

A new battleground

Nvidia, the world's most valuable company, has been the subject of US export controls for years, which limit the sale of its advanced chips to China. The Manus probe shows how the battleground has moved from beyond chips to "models, agents, talent, and enterprise deployment," Murthy Grandhi, a company profiles analyst at research firm GlobalData, told Business Insider.

Hanna Dohmen, senior research analyst at Georgetown's Center for Security and Emerging Technology, told Business Insider that while the probe "isn't entirely surprising," the approach regulators are taking is "more novel" because it "appears to focus on the movement of talent and IP."

Talent has become a focal point of the AI race, with companies like OpenAI, Meta, and Google offering huge pay packages to entice the best and brightest. Last year, Meta invested $14 billion in AI training startup Scale AI, bringing its CEO, Alexandr Wang, over to run the tech giant's AI efforts.

China's Manus probe could signal that it was policing "outbound AI technology transfer with greater rigor," said Grandhi, adding that it could accelerate the "bifurcation of AI ecosystems."

The US and China have been taking diverging approaches to AI, with Chinese companies tending to favor AI models that are more open, such as DeepSeek.

It's not clear how long China's probe will last, should it progress into a full investigation. Other investigations from China's Ministry have taken more than a year.

Grandhi said that in his view, the most likely outcome is that the deal will be approved "with constraints, rather than an outright block."

"Whatever the outcome may be, this certainly sends a signal to other US or foreign companies that are considering similar acquisitions," added Dohmen.