Manus, The Hands Of Fate

So good. So good. So good. New year, new gear. Thousands of fresh active styles are at Nordstrom Rack stores now. Save on top brands like Nike, Puma, and Free People starting at just $35. How did I not know Rack has Adidas? There's always something new. Plus, join the Nordy Club to shop new arrivals first, unlock exclusive discounts, and more. Great brands, great prices. That's why you Rack. Welcome to the final Tech Brew ride home of 2025. I'm Brian McCullough. Today, more on Manus, who they are, how they got positioned to sell, and more on what Meta wants to do with them. OpenAI is paying employees more than anyone in history. The trifold phone is a bit of a dud and, of course, the weekend long read suggestion. Here's what you missed today in the world of tech. If you are looking for enterprise grade identity automation minus the enterprise grade baggage, AKA having your users log on 500 times, Yash ID delivers advanced IAM automation without moving teams onto a legacy identity provider. Whether you use Google Workspace, Microsoft three sixty five, or Okta, YeshID integrates directly. No rebuilds or rip and replaces are required. YeshID helps IT and security teams reduce risk, not just tickets. So I bet IT teams everywhere just breathe the collective sigh of relief. Every access change, review, and approval is tracked and exportable, helping security teams effortlessly demonstrate compliance with SOC two, ISO, or HIPAA. IT and security teams can spot risk before it becomes a finding. Learn more at yeshid.com/techbrew. That's yeshid.com/techbrew. We didn't talk much about Manus really until yesterday's acquisition news, so I wanted to share with you this New York Times piece looking at how Manus distanced itself from its original Chinese roots to court US investors. A source says Meta's 2 and a half billion dollar deal includes a $500,000,000 retention pool for Manus' employees. Quote, before being approached by Meta, Manus executives and the start up's investors weighed staying independent and raising substantially more capital, people familiar with the matter said. Like many successful AI startups, Manus faced a difficult reality. Without a platform partner such as Meta, it would be challenging and costly to reach global scale, and raising additional capital could make the company too expensive for potential suitors. Meta spokesman Andy Stone said that there would be no continuing Chinese ownership interest in Manus after the transaction and that the startup would discontinue its services and operations in China. Meta's deal apparently surprised some officials in Beijing, some of whom disliked the agreement because they considered Manus an example of China's AI power, people familiar with the officials' thinking said. They believe that the sale would give The US access to technology developed by Chinese engineers and encourage other startups to pursue a similar funding path, the people said. But Beijing appears to have few tools to influence the deal given Manus' foothold in Singapore. In Washington, the reaction was …