Elon Musk’s Tesla has filed a lawsuit against a former engineer, accusing him of stealing trade secrets from the company’s Optimus robot program to launch a rival startup.
TechCrunch reports that Elon Musk’s Tesla has taken legal action against Zhongjie “Jay” Li, a former engineer who worked on the company’s Optimus humanoid robotics program. The lawsuit alleges that Li stole trade secrets related to the development of advanced robotic hand sensors and used them to establish his own startup, Proception, which is backed by Y Combinator.
According to the complaint, Li was employed by Tesla from August 2022 to September 2024. During his tenure, he allegedly downloaded confidential information about Optimus onto two personal smartphones. The complaint also states that in the months leading up to his departure, Li conducted research on humanoid robotic hands using his workplace computer and made internet searches related to venture capital and other startup funding sources.
The lawsuit claims that Proception was incorporated less than a week after Li left Tesla, and within just five months, the startup publicly announced that it had successfully built advanced humanoid robotic hands. Tesla alleges that these hands bear a striking resemblance to the designs Li worked on while at the company.
Proception’s website describes the company’s mission as revolutionizing human-robot interaction by developing the world’s most advanced humanoid hands. Both Proception and Tesla have been contacted for further comment on the matter.
Tesla’s Optimus robotics program has faced challenges since its unveiling in 2021. The company initially stated that the Tesla Bot, along with other new products, would be introduced in 2023. However, the project has remained in development.
In July 2024, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced that the company would begin selling the robot in 2026. Later that year, during Tesla’s “We, Robot” event in October, the Optimus bots present were largely controlled by offsite human operators, indicating that the project was still a work in progress.
Breitbart News recently reported that Musk lost the top executive in the Optimus program, who was working in America on an H-1B visa.
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Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship.
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