Hou

Note on entity type: The name in the database ("Hou") does not resolve to a company. It is Dr. Xiaodi Hou (also rendered Hou Xiaodi / Xiao Di Hou), an individual — a computer-vision researcher (Caltech PhD) and co-founder of TuSimple Holdings Inc. He should be tracked as a person-level defendant, not as an operating company or NPE.

Background. Hou co-founded TuSimple in 2015 (San Diego, California), serving as CTO and then, from March 2022, as CEO, President and Chairman until the board terminated him on October 30, 2022. TuSimple went public on Nasdaq (TSP) in 2021, delisted in early 2024, and rebranded as CreateAI Holdings Inc. in December 2024 after pivoting to generative AI, games and animation. Hou resigned from the board in March 2023. He is now founder and CEO of Bot Auto, a Houston-based L4 autonomous trucking venture founded in 2023 that raised roughly $20 million in pre-Series A funding (per TechCrunch, Forbes and company statements; employee count reported at ~45 in 2025).

Litigation posture. Hou appears only as a defendant (4 of 4 tracked cases; zero as plaintiff). Neither venue — the Southern District of California and the Delaware Court of Chancery — is a patent venue, and none of the tracked matters is a patent suit.

Notable matters. Wilhoite et al. v. Hou et al. (S.D. Cal., filed Dec. 22, 2023; Nature of Suit: Defend Trade Secrets Act) names Hou alongside Mo Chen, Cheng Lu, Guowei Charles Chao, Charles Chao and TuSimple Holdings as defendants. Nusbaum v. Hou, Young v. Hou and Wolfson v. Hou are stockholder derivative actions in the Delaware Court of Chancery against TuSimple officers and directors alleging breaches of fiduciary duty relating to a Hydron related-party transaction, board restructuring and disclosure issues; they were consolidated in 2023. Separately, CreateAI/TuSimple has sued Bot Auto over alleged trade-secret and patent misappropriation, and Hou's White Marble entities litigated voting-agreement control of the company in Chancery. Capsule summaries above are drawn from court dockets and SEC filings; no merits conclusions are implied.