The journey of how we built Manus

Tao, the co-founder and CPO of Manus, shares the company's journey, highlighting its recognition on the a16z AI apps list and its $100M ARR achievement in under nine months. The talk covers the evolution from their first product, Monika, a Chrome browser plugin with various AI-driven features, to the unsuccessful attempt at creating an AI-native browser called Rift. The pivotal moment came from observing non-coders using Cursor, inspiring the creation of Manus, which gives LLMs a virtual machine in the cloud. Tao details Manus' architecture, its viral launch, the challenges faced with scaling and pricing, and the subsequent product improvements, including WideRacer and MailManus. The talk concludes with a reflection on the company's success and future prospects.