United States tire distributor Horizon Tire, Inc. filed a lawsuit yesterday in Texas court against new Houston-based tire company Flagship Tire & Wheel, LLC and three former Horizon employees, charging that they conspired to interfere with Horizon’s business and exclusive distributorship agreement with Chinese tire manufacturer Shandong Linglong Tire Co., Ltd.

The lawsuit charges the former employees - Benjamin Shan, Sylvia Hermosillo and Haitao “Oliver” Zhang - with violating fiduciary duties to Horizon and non-competition agreements, when they left Horizon to found Flagship as Horizon’s competitor. The lawsuit alleges that the former employees set up Flagship in cooperation with Linglong.

In June 2015, Horizon sued Linglong in a California federal court alleging the company violated Horizon’s exclusive rights to distribute Crosswind tires in the U.S. In response, Linglong disputed the California court’s jurisdiction and filed a lawsuit against Horizon in Ohio federal court claiming the tire distributor breached contracts with Linglong and is trying to hold the company to an allegedly nonexistent exclusive distribution agreement.

After retaining Weisbrod Matteis & Copley PLLC (WMC), a Washington, DC law firm, Horizon agreed to litigate all of Horizon’s claims against Linglong in Ohio, where Linglong sued and therefore conceded the Ohio court’s jurisdiction. “Horizon welcomes the opportunity to get to the merits of the litigation in Ohio,” said Augie Matteis, WMC’s managing partner.

“Horizon has no interest in wasting time and money fighting over which court to be in,” Horizon co-founder Christina Wang said. “We want to get to trial in this case as quickly as possible so we can prove our allegations and return to focusing on our distribution business.”

WMC proved in previous litigation that Linglong stole intellectual property from another U.S. tire company, Alpha Mining Systems, and its founder, Jordan Fishman. Linglong was found liable for $26 million in damages in 2010, lost its appeal in 2012 and then tried to avoid paying the judgment. WMC and Fishman responded by filing many collection actions across the country that ultimately forced Linglong to pay its share of the judgment in 2013.

Linglong argued similarly in the Alpha lawsuit that they were not subject to a Virginia federal court’s jurisdiction. The court disagreed. “Linglong has made a practice of trying to avoid the reach of U.S. courts while doing hundreds of millions of dollars of business here,” Matteis said.