Adhesives & Sealants Patents: Who Leads, Where the Gaps Are 2026
- 80.6% concentration. The top 5 assignees account for 225 of the 279 records in scope — a field where a handful of portfolios set the terms.
- One filer dominates. The leading assignee alone holds 183 records; fifth place holds just 9, showing how sharp the drop-off is below the leader.
- Filing has cooled since its 2017 peak. Filings peaked at 34 in 2017 and growth from 2021 to 2024 (the last complete year) fell -50%, though recent years are still filling in.
Filing growth compares 2021 (8 records) with 2024 (4) — a three-year span. 2024 is the most recent year we treat as complete: publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so 2025 onwards are still filling in and any growth rate that ends there would understate the field. Top-5 share is the combined record count of the five largest assignees divided by all 279 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What the adhesives and sealants patent record shows
The dataset covers 279 published records filed against terms spanning surface adhesives, coating deposition and interface adhesion between 2015 and 2026. Filing activity is not evenly spread: it peaked in 2017 at 34 records and has since settled into a lower, steadier pace. The assignee ranking is heavily front-loaded, with 80.6% of all records sitting with just five organisations and 93.5% with ten.
That concentration matters for anyone assessing freedom to operate: a small number of portfolios control most of the claim space that appears in this search, and the most-cited records in the set date back to the mid-to-late 1990s and early 2000s — meaning influence in this corpus still traces to older, foundational filings rather than to the most recent activity.
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Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 279 records: how filing volume has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses the underlying inventions actually sit in.
Filing trend: a 2017 peak, then a cooling curve
Annual filings rose to a peak of 34 in 2017, then declined; the drop from 8 filings in 2021 to 4 in 2024 is a -50% swing over that span. 2025 and 2026 figures are undercounted because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, so the most recent bars should be read as provisional rather than as a continuing fall.
Technology composition: layered products lead, adhesives and coatings follow
B32B (layered products & laminates) appears in 38.0% of the 279 records, ahead of C08J (polymer processing & solutions) at 24.4% and C09J (adhesives proper) at 23.3%. B44C (decorative arts & surface finishing) and C08L (polymer compositions) each clear one-fifth of records, while C09D (coatings, paints & inks), B29C (shaping of plastics) and G09F (displaying, advertising & signs) sit further down. Because records can carry multiple IPC codes, these shares add up to well over 100% and should be read individually, not summed.
Shares are the percentage of the 279 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Adhesives & Sealants Patent Landscape with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about adhesives & sealants patent landscape and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe most-cited records and a representative filing
EP2806002A1 — aqueous stripping composition for polymeric surface sealants
The filing describes an aqueous stripping composition for removing polymeric surface sealants — including polyurethane, polyethylene, polyacrylic and polysilicate sealants — from metal surfaces. Its active chemistry combines an alkalizing agent, a gluconate-based polymer-splitting agent, a glycol-ether or aliphatic-alcohol swelling agent, and a cloud point booster.Filed by MacDermid Enthone Inc., published 2014-11-26.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US5795636A | Positionable and repositionable adhesive article | 169 |
| 2 | US6855386B1 | Wet surface adhesives | 81 |
| 3 | US6217695B1 | Method and apparatus for radiation heating substrates and applying extruded material | 72 |
| 4 | US6613411B2 | Conformable multi-layer sheet materials | 65 |
| 5 | US6809169B2 | Polysiloxane coatings for surfaces | 53 |
| 6 | WO2000056828A1 | Wet surface adhesives | 52 |
| 7 | WO1997018276A1 | Repositionable adhesive article | 48 |
| 8 | US6660352B2 | Adhesive electrostatic sheets | 42 |
| 9 | US4170678A | Multiple use article for conditioning fabrics in a clothes dryer | 38 |
| 10 | US20140141214A1 | Graphic article | 35 |
Citation counts inside this searched corpus favour older filings — treat them as a signal of influence on the field, not of current commercial relevance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Reading the concentration, the trend and the citation pattern together points to a field where the claim space is largely staked out at the top, but recent momentum has narrowed to almost nobody.
Five portfolios set the terms
With 225 of 279 records held by five assignees, most freedom-to-operate questions in this space resolve to checking a short list of portfolios rather than scanning a long tail. The leader alone holds 183 records — well over half the entire dataset.
Filing has cooled from its 2017 peak
Volume peaked at 34 filings in 2017 and has fallen since; the -50% change from 2021 to 2024 is the most recent complete-year comparison available. Figures for 2025 and 2026 are still filling in given the typical 18-month publication lag, so treat the very latest bars as incomplete rather than as continued decline.
Layered products dominate the claim language
B32B (layered products & laminates) is the single most common IPC subclass, ahead of polymer processing (C08J) and adhesives proper (C09J). Coatings (C09D), plastics shaping (B29C) and signage (G09F) each cover a smaller but still meaningful slice of filings.
Influence sits with older, foundational filings
The most-cited record in the corpus, on positionable and repositionable adhesive articles, carries 169 citations — far ahead of the next entries. All of the top-cited records predate the more recent filing years, a pattern typical of citation counts inside a bounded corpus.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to adhesives & sealants patent landscape, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who holds the portfolios, and where the gate sits
The ranked leaders span 43 companies, but the practical gate for a new entrant is set by a handful of names at the top, not by the full list.
One assignee dominates the ranking outright
The top-ranked assignee holds 183 of the 279 records in scope — nearly two-thirds of the entire dataset on its own. Any competitive assessment in this space starts by mapping claims against this single portfolio before looking further down the list.
A steep fall after the leader
Fifth place in the ranking holds just 9 records, and tenth place holds 7 — a sharp step down from the leader's 183. The result is a field with one dominant player and a compressed cluster of much smaller filers behind it.
A small cluster of named co-inventors files together
Ten co-assignee pairs appear in the data, with the strongest three pairs — all involving the same small group of individual named inventors — sharing 11 records each. This points to a tight, individually-driven filing group operating alongside the larger corporate portfolios.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| 3M Innovative Properties Co. | 1 | — |
| Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary | 0 | — |
| 3M Company | 0 | — |
| The Boeing Company | 0 | — |
| STEELMAN RONALD S | 0 | — |
| NIELSEN JOHN A | 0 | — |
| LYON KEITH R | 0 | — |
| Dentsply Sirona Inc. | 0 | — |
Where to take this next
The dataset points to next steps for both freedom-to-operate work and claim drafting around the less-crowded branches.
Map the leader's claim boundaries first
With one assignee holding 183 of 279 records, any new filing or product launch in this space should start by checking claim scope against that single portfolio before assessing the rest of the field.
Explore assignee portfolios in Eureka →Test white space in under-claimed branches
Sub-areas like wet-surface adhesion and radiation-cured coating deposition carry lighter filing density than the core B32B and C09J classes. That is a starting point for claim drafting, not a guarantee the space stays open.
Run a white-space search in Eureka →Weight citation signals by age
The most-cited records in this corpus date back decades; treat citation count as a marker of foundational influence, not of what is commercially active today.
Trace citation networks in Eureka →Common questions on adhesives and sealants patents
The dataset of 279 records is heavily concentrated: the top five assignees together hold 80.6% of all records, and the single leading assignee alone accounts for 183 of them. Below that leader the field drops off sharply, with fifth place holding only 9 records and tenth place 7. This means a competitive read of the space is really a read of a handful of portfolios rather than a broad field of equally-sized players.
Filings peaked at 34 in 2017 and have declined since, with the most recent complete-year comparison — 2021 to 2024 — showing a -50% change. Figures for 2025 and 2026 look lower still, but that is largely because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, so those years are undercounted rather than genuinely quiet. The safest read is that the field has cooled from its 2017 high, not that it has stopped.
Layered products and laminates (IPC class B32B) appear in 38.0% of the 279 records, making it the single largest technology bucket, ahead of polymer processing (C08J, 24.4%) and adhesives proper (C09J, 23.3%). Decorative arts and surface finishing (B44C) and polymer compositions (C08L) each cover close to a fifth of records. Because a single filing can carry several IPC codes, these percentages overlap rather than sum to 100%.
EP2806002A1, filed by MacDermid Enthone, claims an aqueous stripping composition for removing polymeric surface sealants — including polyurethane, polyethylene and polyacrylic sealants — from metal surfaces using a specific combination of an alkalizing agent, a gluconate polymer-splitting agent, a glycol-ether or aliphatic-alcohol swelling agent and a cloud point booster. Anyone developing sealant-removal or metal-surface-prep chemistry should check their formulation against this specific reagent combination rather than against stripping compositions generally. The claim is chemistry-specific, so alternative splitting or swelling agents outside the stated classes may sit outside its scope.
Sub-areas such as wet-surface adhesion chemistries, radiation-cured coating deposition and polysiloxane surface coatings show up in the record but with materially lighter filing density than the dominant B32B and C09J classes. That lighter density is a signal worth investigating, not proof the space is open — it could also reflect that fewer applicants have chosen to pursue that specific claim language. A proper freedom-to-operate check against the leading portfolios is still the necessary next step before filing.
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Disclaimer. This page is generated from Patsnap Eureka data drawn from a limited snapshot of global patent and scientific-literature records, and is provided for general information and reference only.
Patent data carries inherent limitations: recent filings (typically the most recent 18–24 months) are under-counted due to standard publication lag; counts may be reported at either a patent-family or a patent-record basis and are not always directly comparable; classification, applicant-name, and citation data may contain errors, duplicates, or omissions; and the underlying search query defines and constrains the scope shown. As a result, the analysis may be incomplete or inaccurate and may not reflect the full technology landscape.
Nothing on this page constitutes an exhaustive prior-art, novelty, freedom-to-operate, or validity search, nor does it constitute legal, financial, investment, or professional advice, and it should not be relied upon as such. Any patent, commercial, or strategic decision should be verified independently and reviewed with qualified patent, legal, and domain professionals. Patsnap makes no warranties, express or implied, as to the accuracy, completeness, or fitness for any particular purpose of the information presented.
Machine translation. Assignee and organisation names originally recorded in Chinese, Japanese or Korean have been rendered into English by an AI translation step so that the tables stay readable. These renderings are best-effort and may not match a company’s registered English name; the original name is what the underlying patent record carries, and it is what any Eureka query launched from this page uses.