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Techmeme
December 30, 2025, 4:45 PM
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Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Meta is buying Manus for $2B+; Manus was raising at a $2B valuation when Meta approached it; Manus CEO Xiao Hong will report to Meta COO Javier Olivan  —  The deal for more than $2 billion is one of the first in which a major U.S. tech company has bought a startup with Chinese roots
Bloomberg:
Meta agrees to acquire Singapore-based startup Manus, which makes an AI agent for SMBs; Manus said earlier in December its annual revenue run rate was $125M+  —  Meta Platforms Inc. has agreed to buy Manus, a popular Singapore-based artificial intelligence agent with Chinese roots …
Nikkei Asia:
Meta says Manus, initially based in Beijing and Wuhan, will cut Chinese investor ties after the deal and “will discontinue its services and operations in China”
Meta:
Meta says it will continue to operate and sell the Manus service, and Manus' talent will join Meta to deliver agents across Meta products, including Meta AI
Samantha Subin / CNBC:
Sources: SoftBank has completed its $40B investment in OpenAI  —  SoftBank has completed its $40 billion investment commitment to OpenAI, sources told CNBC's David Faber.  —  The Japanese investment giant sent over a final $22 billion to $22.5 billion last week, according to sources familiar …
Osmond Chia / BBC:
China's draft AI rules have measures to protect kids, like time limits and parental consent, ban gambling promotion content, and add suicide chats restrictions  —  China has proposed strict new rules for artificial intelligence (AI) to provide safeguards for children and prevent chatbots …
CTech:
Sources: Nvidia is in advanced talks to acquire Tel Aviv-based AI21, which is building its own LLMs, for $2B to $3B; the deal would resemble an acquihire  —  EXCLUSIVE: The move would mark Nvidia's fourth major Israeli purchase and signal the limits of Israel's LLM ambitions.
Hyunjoo Jin / Reuters:
Sources: the US has granted an annual license to Samsung and SK Hynix to ship their chip manufacturing equipment to their facilities in China for 2026  —  The U.S. government has granted an annual licence to Samsung Electronics (005930.KS) and SK Hynix (000660.KS) to bring in chip manufacturing equipment …
Themis Qi / South China Morning Post:
Zhipu AI launches a share sale to raise ~$560M in a Hong Kong IPO at a valuation of ~$6.6B, which would make it the first LLM developer listed in Hong Kong  —  The company, marketed overseas as Z.ai, eyes US$6.6 billion valuation with Hong Kong's first large language model listing
Zak Killian / Tom's Hardware:
IDC expects shipments of PCs could shrink by up to 9% YoY in 2026 due to global memory shortages, as demand from AI data centers continues to outstrip supply  —  Memory shortages are expected to have a serious impact on the PC and smartphone market. … The International Data Corporation …
More: IDC, 9to5Mac, TrendForce, MacTech.com, PetaPixel, and Pocket-lint
LinkedIn: Bryan Ma.  Bluesky: @carnage4life.  Forums: r/technology

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From Mediagazer

Todd Spangler / Variety:
Memo: Skydance offers certain employees a voluntary buyout in a “one-time offer” and moves to a mandatory five-days-per-week in-office policy

Ashley Carman / Bloomberg:
Netflix hires Steve Wilson, who formerly managed partner relations at Apple Podcasts, as a consultant to oversee podcast content acquisition

Etan Vlessing / The Hollywood Reporter:
Lionsgate and Steven Paul's SP Media form a JV to invest in new businesses and indie film production; a source says Paul is leading an investment of ~$100M

Earlier Picks

Financial Times:
UK-based Octopus Energy reaches a deal to sell about $1B of equity in Kraken Technologies, its tech spin-off, at an $8.65B valuation to a syndicate of investors
Vikki Blake / Eurogamer.net:
Michał Kiciński, co-founder of CD Projekt and DRM-free digital games store GOG, acquires 100% ownership of GOG from CD Projekt and signs a distribution deal
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