Faraday Future, a US electric car maker founded by Chinese businessman Jia Yueting, is taking Human Horizons, manufacturer of the struggling new energy vehicle marque HiPhi, and its founder to court for suspected infringement of intellectual property rights and unfair competition.

Faraday Future is demanding that Human Horizons and Ding Lei immediately halt their infringement of trade secrets related to the California-based company’s flagship vehicle the FF91, and provide compensation, according to documents filed to the Shenzhen Intermediate People’s Court today. No details were given as to the amount of compensation requested.

Human Horizons was dismissed as ‘a disgrace to the industry’ by Jia last month when the EV startup, which is teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, said it is suspending production for six months. Ding said shortly afterwards that the Shanghai-based company only has three months to save itself.

HiPhi has four electric car models on the market, with prices ranging from CNY339,000 (USD47,000) to CNY800,000. Since starting deliveries in 2021 up to March 11, 2022, the firm shipped 5,142 autos.

This is still significantly more than Faraday Future which had only delivered 10 vehicles as of the end of 2023, despite the FF91 being nine years in the making.

Ding founded Human Horizons in August 2017, and is said to have taken a group of core staff members and some materials from his old company Letv Automobile, where he served as CEO for China and the Asia-Pacific region, with him, Securities Times reported last month. However, Yang Yueqing, engineering project director at HiPhi, recently denied this rumor.

A number of companies have shown interest in a possible acquisition. Chongqing Changan Automobile plans to buy a 51 percent stake in Human Horizons, Chairman Zhu Huarong said last week.

（Picture: Veer）