{"id":"657e45aa-50cb-4690-a0b3-2fc542afd41c","slug":"regulatory-action-2025-06-12-proception","kind":"regulatory_action","headline":"Tesla sued Proception founder Jay Li alleging theft of Optimus robot trade secrets","summary":"Tesla filed a lawsuit in June 2025 accusing former Optimus engineer Jay Li of stealing confidential humanoid robot trade secrets before leaving to found Proception. The case was settled and dismissed in June 2026.","occurredAt":"2025-06-12T12:00:00.000Z","reviewStatus":"unreviewed","modelId":null,"deploymentId":null,"companyId":"fbcf0031-defc-4535-baf6-30fbc8170602","aliases":[],"collisionRisk":"none","reviewNote":null,"severity":"moderate","rootCauseCategory":null,"rootCauseDetail":null,"affectedUnitsCount":null,"affectedUnitsBasis":null,"remediationStatus":null,"regulatoryAction":"inquiry_opened","regulatoryBody":"other","propertyDamageEstimateUsd":null,"damageEstimateBasis":null,"bodilyInjurySeverity":null,"fatalityCount":null,"lossCostClass":null,"sourceQualityTier":null,"createdAt":"2026-07-02T17:08:48.603Z","updatedAt":"2026-07-02T17:08:48.603Z","model":null,"deployment":null,"company":{"id":"fbcf0031-defc-4535-baf6-30fbc8170602","name":"Proception","slug":"proception","description":"Silicon Valley startup developing dexterous robotic hands for humanoid manipulation. Founded in 2024 by ex-[Tesla](/companies/tesla) Optimus engineer Jay Li and Jack Xu, the company's flagship product ProHand 1.0 is a 22-degree-of-freedom, tendon-driven robotic hand designed to give humanoid robots human-level manipulation capabilities. Proception is a Y Combinator W25 alum and also offers ProGlove 1.0, a wearable data-capture glove for training manipulation policies from human demonstrations.","status":null,"founded":2024,"hq":"Palo Alto, CA","fundingTotal":"11000000","type":"hardware","reviewStatus":"reviewed","sources":[{"url":"https://techcrunch.com/2026/06/29/robot-hand-company-settles-tesla-trade-secret-suit-and-announces-11m-raise/","title":"Robot hand company settles Tesla trade secret suit and announces $11M raise","sourceName":"TechCrunch"},{"url":"https://www.proception.ai/news/introducing-prohand","title":"Introducing ProHand","sourceName":"Proception (official)"}],"keyFacts":[{"label":"Funding","value":"$11M seed (2026)"},{"label":"Lead investor","value":"First Round Capital"},{"label":"Other investors","value":"Y Combinator, BoxGroup"},{"label":"Founder","value":"Jay Li (ex-Tesla Optimus tech lead)"},{"label":"CEO","value":"Jay Li"},{"label":"Co-founder","value":"Jack Xu"},{"label":"Seed funding","value":"1M (2026, led by First Round Capital)"},{"label":"YC batch","value":"W25"},{"label":"Product","value":"ProHand 1.0 (22 DoF robotic hand)"}],"aliases":[],"collisionRisk":"low","reviewNote":null,"atsProvider":null,"atsSlug":null,"createdAt":"2026-07-02T14:59:46.694Z","updatedAt":"2026-07-02T17:09:00.634Z"},"derived":{"status":"active"},"sources":[{"id":"5d102d22-b77b-4dff-a1ce-2f726d73a764","incidentId":"657e45aa-50cb-4690-a0b3-2fc542afd41c","url":"https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/tesla-lawsuit-says-former-engineer-stole-secrets-robotics-startup-2025-06-12/","label":null,"publishedAt":null,"notes":null,"title":"Tesla lawsuit says former engineer stole secrets for robotics startup","sourceName":"Reuters","mediaType":"article","videoId":null,"channel":null,"durationSec":null,"timestampSec":null,"createdAt":"2026-07-02T17:08:48.760Z","updatedAt":"2026-07-02T17:08:48.760Z"}],"responses":[],"statusEvents":[{"id":"03587e0b-72a4-4d80-ab00-a545f5c55bf0","incidentId":"657e45aa-50cb-4690-a0b3-2fc542afd41c","status":"active","reason":null,"source":"agent:depth","effectiveAt":"2026-07-02T17:08:48.934Z","createdAt":"2026-07-02T17:08:48.935Z"}],"jsonLd":{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://registry.deploy.report/incidents/regulatory-action-2025-06-12-proception","url":"https://registry.deploy.report/incidents/regulatory-action-2025-06-12-proception","headline":"Tesla sued Proception founder Jay Li alleging theft of Optimus robot trade secrets","description":"Tesla filed a lawsuit in June 2025 accusing former Optimus engineer Jay Li of stealing confidential humanoid robot trade secrets before leaving to found Proception. The case was settled and dismissed in June 2026.","identifier":"657e45aa-50cb-4690-a0b3-2fc542afd41c","datePublished":"2025-06-12T12:00:00.000Z","articleSection":"regulatory action","publisher":{"@id":"https://deploy.report/#organization"},"author":{"@id":"https://deploy.report/#organization"}},"framework_metadata":{"framework_schema_version":"0.1.0","verification_status":"unreviewed","maturity_stage":null,"lifecycle_state":null,"architectural_position":{"cohort":null,"sub_cohorts":[]},"within_cohort_verified_vs_claimed_pair":null,"cap_flags":[],"verification_depth":{"sources_count":1,"primary_source_types":["secondary-established-publication"]}}}