China media highlight multi‑billion Meta–Manus and SoftBank AI bets

Read together, Chinese financial coverage of Meta–Manus and SoftBank–DigitalBridge paints a clear picture: the capital markets now see two main levers in the race to AGI—general-purpose agents at the application layer, and industrial‑scale compute and connectivity at the infrastructure layer. Meta is paying up for a Chinese‑founded agent that many in the local ecosystem hailed as a ‘second DeepSeek moment’, while SoftBank is writing a $4 billion check to secure data-center and fiber assets that will feed its Project Stargate and OpenAI bets.([news.pedaily.cn](https://news.pedaily.cn/202512/559307.shtml))

For observers in China and across Asia, this coverage reinforces a sense that the AI stack is consolidating into a few vertically integrated ecosystems with global reach. Domestic startups building their own agents or training clusters are being benchmarked against Manus and DigitalBridge-like outcomes: either become attractive enough to be bought by a hyperscaler, or plug into their infrastructure as a specialized node. That dynamic can accelerate AGI timelines by concentrating resources, but it also risks narrowing the diversity of approaches and governance models.

The tone of the Chinese reporting—equal parts awe at capital intensity and concern about bubbles—also hints at rising skepticism about whether all this spending will generate sustainable returns. If sentiment turns sharply, it could cool late‑stage funding for frontier ventures, slowing the next wave of large‑scale model and infra buildouts.