Avionics Data Bus Patents: Who Leads, Where the Gaps Are 2026
Avionics data bus patents: mapping bus controller and remote terminal claims
57.4% of the field sits with five assignees. 170 of 296 records in scope belong to the top five filers, with a long tail of single- and few-filing entrants behind them. Filings ran from 25 in 2017 to a peak of 33 in 2018, then eased across the following years; the last complete year, 2024, recorded 3 filings versus 14 in 2021 — a 79% decline over that three-year window. The 2025-2026 figures are not yet representative given publication lag.
- 1THE BOEING CO89
- 2HONEYWELL INTERNATIONAL INC31
- 3SAAB AB26
- 4RAYTHEON BBN TECHNOLOGIES CORP13
- 5ARILOU INFORMATION SECURITY TECH LTD11
See the full avionics data bus technology analysis in Eureka
- The complete ranking, not just the top five
- Every IPC branch with its share of the corpus
- The most-cited records, and where claim space is still thin
Common questions about avionics data bus patents
Who holds the most patents in avionics data bus technology?
The ranked leader in this dataset holds 89 of the 296 records in scope, with the top five assignees together accounting for 57.4% of all records. That concentration is driven by long-established aerospace primes and defence contractors that have filed continuously since before this dataset’s 2015 start date. Behind the top ranks, 78 companies appear in the full ranking, so there is still a long tail of smaller and newer filers entering the space.
Is avionics data bus patent filing activity growing or shrinking?
Filing peaked in 2018 at 33 records and has since declined, with the last complete year, 2024, recording just 3 filings against 14 in 2021 — a 79% drop over that span. This should not be read as the technology going stale; high past filing density means the core bus-controller and remote-terminal claim space is already occupied, which can itself discourage new filings. The 2025-2026 figures are undercounted because of the roughly 18-month lag between filing and publication.
What patent classes cover avionics data bus technology?
The dominant classes are G06F (electric digital data processing) at 38.9% of the 296 records and H04L (digital information transmission) at 34.8%, both well ahead of aircraft-specific class B64D at 8.4%. This shows the claim activity has shifted toward the software and transmission logic layered on top of the physical bus, rather than the physical bus hardware itself. A single record often carries several of these classes at once, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Disclaimer. This analysis is based on Patsnap Eureka data drawn from a limited snapshot of global patent records and is provided for general information and reference only. Patent data carries inherent limitations — recent filings are under-counted because of publication lag, counts may be on a record or family basis, classification and applicant-name data may contain errors or duplicates, and the underlying search query defines the scope shown — so the analysis may be incomplete or inaccurate and may not reflect the full technology landscape.
Nothing here is an exhaustive prior-art, novelty, freedom-to-operate or validity search, nor does it constitute legal, financial or professional advice, and it should not be relied upon as such. Verify independently and review with qualified patent and legal professionals before acting on it.
Method: Filing trend and technology composition. Derived from a Patsnap search on Avionics Data Bus Technology covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish. Every share divides by all records in scope. Data: Patsnap Eureka. See the full landscape report.