China Shifts the Scales of AI with a Vengeful Openness

Beijing continues to strengthen its position in the global AI race, and this time it is shining a spotlight on Manus, a company that has begun to attract local attention after achieving widespread global adoption.

On Tuesday, the company registered its AI assistant, Monica, for operation in China, paving the way for its expansion into the domestic market after clearing the regulatory registration hurdle.

After Chinese company DeepSec made waves in Silicon Valley with its powerful models that rival American products, but at a much lower cost, Chinese investors have begun searching for the next local company capable of transforming the global tech landscape… and Manus could be it.

A few weeks ago, news of Manus spread on the X platform (formerly Twitter) after it unveiled what it described as the “world’s first artificial general intelligence agent,” a system that can make decisions and execute tasks autonomously with less need for guidance than systems like ChatGPT and DeepSec.