Chinese technology billionaire Chen Tianqiao’s artificial intelligence start-up MiroMind is suspending its services in mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau, in the latest sign that some of the country’s most globally ambitious firms are increasingly retreating from the domestic market as geopolitical tensions reshape the industry following the Manus saga.
In an email sent to select users on Wednesday, the company said that its MiroThinker services would stop operating in regions including mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau from May 12 because of “business adjustments”, with no timeline for resumption, according to a Beijing-based user who received the email.
The company is offering refunds and data export options for affected users, it said in the email.
A customer service representative at MiroMind confirmed the service suspension on Thursday in response to an inquiry from the South China Morning Post.
The move comes shortly after a recent interview with Bloomberg in which Chen publicly described erecting strict internal “firewalls” between the company’s regional operations in response to heightened scrutiny from Beijing following Meta’s acquisition of Manus.
A protocol to limit cross-border sharing of information or code was implemented after Beijing contacted Chen’s team in early March, cautioning against a unilateral technology transfer out of the country, he said in the interview.
Chen added that the concern has been resolved after implementing the business “firewall”, while acknowledging that “companies effectively have no choice but to pick a side” amid the current “extremely complex” international environment and geopolitical conditions.
In late April after a months-long inquiry, Chinese regulators called off Meta’s US$2 billion acquisition of Manus, asking both sides to unwind the deal.
MiroMind’s service suspension underscores how Chinese AI firms with global ambitions are increasingly facing the dilemma of choosing to remain tied to China’s domestic ecosystem or restructuring themselves as offshore entities to pursue global capital, customers and resources.
Chen, a legendary Chinese online gaming entrepreneur, announced in a social media post in early April that his organisation was building out a large-scale AI compute infrastructure using more than 10,000 of Nvidia’s Blackwell chips, which are under export control for Chinese mainland-based entities.
The SCMP reported in January that MiroMind was relocating some of its Shanghai-based staff to Singapore, which was part of restructuring moves made by the firm to divide its operations for compliance reasons.
The restructuring split MiroMind’s operations into a Singapore-based entity focused on AI research and core technology breakthroughs, while separate regional subsidiaries would handle local AI applications and industry deployment, the company said at the time.
MiroMind’s main product includes the MiroThinker, an AI research agent optimised for multi-step reasoning and deep online search tasks, which remains available for a global audience.