Manus 2.0 wants to run the back office of Europe’s small businesses. Before you hand it the keys, ask whose hand it is.
FROM THE EDITORS
Manus is Latin for “hand.” In nine months that hand was sold to Menlo Park, pulled back by Beijing, and wiped clean of some of its own memory. This week it’s reaching out again, offering to answer your inbox, cut your ads and carry your wallet.
The product is serious. Manus 2.0 is built on a new agent harness called Cascade, which Manus says used 23.2% fewer tokens, finished tasks 28.2% faster and cost 32% less to run than the previous system in one tested configuration. Note “one tested configuration”: that’s a benchmark, not a promise on your invoice. The bigger change is Automations. Tasks no longer just run on a schedule. A new email, a change in ad performance, a calendar event, a Slack message or a Notion update can all trigger a task, set up from a single prompt.
For a ten-person firm in Aarhus or Lyon, that is the pitch in one sentence: the agency you can’t afford, rented by the token. Add a Video Editor aimed at 30–60 second product ads that needs no editing experience and a Cloud Computer you can buy as a permanent home for an automation, and the marketing department of one starts to look like a department.
Then comes Cue, the new standalone app, and the pitch becomes a question. In Cue, each agent has its own email, phone number, wallet and computer, so it can send messages, pay within a budget you set, and take your calls. That isn’t a tool. It’s an employee with an inbox and a card. An employee needs an employer you can name.
Here’s the employer’s CV. Meta announced it would acquire Manus, and on April 27, 2026, China’s National Development and Reform Commission blocked the deal. Then, in August, the bill came due for users. Manus said data generated by certain users on or after December 29, 2025 would be deleted to comply with regulatory requirements in specific jurisdictions. Manus resumed independent operations under its founding team on September 1, 2026, and Tencent has been in talks to become its largest shareholder, Reuters reported.
Singaporean on the letterhead. American for eight months. Chinese on the veto.
The defence is fair: Manus stressed the deletion was not the result of a hack or data breach, but a regulatory step in the separation. That is exactly the point. Nobody broke in. Your data was simply subject to the rules of jurisdictions you don’t vote in. No European SME was consulted, and none could have been.
That’s the calculation for small business in the EU. When your agent emails a customer from its own address, you are still the data controller under GDPR, and the agent’s platform is your processor. It’s your name on the data processing agreement, and your problem when the processor’s ownership moves again.
Before you hand over the keys:
- Start with work that holds no personal data: ad cuts, product videos, market research. Keep customer inboxes for later.
- Ask for the DPA and the data location in writing, and check what happens to your data if ownership changes.
- Keep your own exports. The August backup deadline was a fire drill. Treat it as practice.
- Cap the wallet low. An agent spending “within the budget you set” is only as safe as the budget.
Manus 2.0 may well be the most capable hired hand a small European business can rent this autumn. Rent the hand. Keep the keys.
Sources
- Introducing Manus 2.0 — Manus
- AI startup Manus to resume independent operations as deal with Meta unwinds — Reuters
- China blocks Meta’s $2 billion takeover of AI startup Manus — CNBC
- Manus (AI agent) — Wikipedia
- Meta Acquisition Officially Collapses, Manus Announces Return to Independent Operations — BigGo Finance
- Manus AI Review (2026) — Carly
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