Building Automation Patents: Who Leads, Where Gaps Are 2026
- 25.9% sits with a handful of filers. The top 5 assignees combined account for 291 of the 1,124 records in scope, while a long tail of single- and few-filing entrants fills out the ranked leaders.
- Filing pace has held, not surged. Complete-year filings ran flat from 2021 (67) to 2024 (66), a -1% span, after peaking at 94 in 2023 — publication lag means 2025-2026 counts will still rise.
- Control and connectivity classes dominate together. G05B control systems (38.0%) and H04L digital transmission (34.4%) both sit above a third of all 1,124 records, showing control logic and networking claims are filed jointly, not separately.
Filing growth compares 2021 (67 records) with 2024 (66) — 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 1,124 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What the building automation patent record shows
Building automation and controls patenting spans the mechanics of regulating a physical system — control parameter, process variable, controller output, equipment state — and the software layer now wrapped around it: cloud platforms, wireless sensor networks and increasingly AI-based control models. The 1,124 records in scope, filed between 2015 and the 2026 data cut-off, sit at the intersection of these two worlds, which is why control-systems and digital-transmission IPC classes both post double-digit shares rather than one dominating outright.
Because publication trails filing by roughly 18 months, the most recent one to two years in any trend understate real filing activity. The 2023 peak of 94 records is the most reliable recent signal; 2025 and 2026 figures will continue to fill in as later publications land.
Filing trends and technology composition
Two views of the same 1,124-record dataset: how filing volume has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses carry the claim density.
Filing trend, 2017-2026
Annual filings rose from 31 in 2017 to a peak of 94 in 2023, then eased to 19 by 2026 — a figure still climbing as later publications are indexed. The complete-year comparison (2021's 67 versus 2024's 66, a -1% change) is the fairest read of recent momentum; treat 2025 and 2026 as provisional.
IPC subclass composition
G05B (control & regulating systems, 38.0% of records) and H04L (digital information transmission, 34.4%) are the two largest classes, followed by G06F electric data processing (19.7%), G06Q business/admin data processing (13.7%), F24F air conditioning & ventilation (12.9%), H04W wireless networks (11.7%), G05D non-electric variable control (10.1%) and G06N AI-based computing (9.3%). Because records carry multiple classes, these shares add up past 100% and should be read against the 1,124-record total, not against each other.
Shares are the percentage of the 1,124 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Building Automation & Controls Patent Landscape with Eureka
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Try EurekaThe most-cited records in this space
US10365619B2 — Technologies for optimally individualized building automation
Technologies for individualized building automation include a building automation application server, a building controller, and several mobile computing devices. Each mobile computing device generates individualized sensor data based on the time and location of the device and sensor data indicative of a building system control parameter, such as temperature or humidity, gathered from external sensors. The application server aggregates this individualized sensor data across devices and generates a building system configuration based on it.Filed by ABB Schweiz AG, granted 2019-07-30.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US6437692B1 | System and method for monitoring and controlling remote devices | 2,093 |
| 2 | US20130201316A1 | System and method for server based control | 1,727 |
| 3 | US7053767B2 | System and method for monitoring and controlling remote devices | 783 |
| 4 | US20200348662A1 | Platform for facilitating development of intelligence in an industrial internet of things system | 733 |
| 5 | US20210157312A1 | Intelligent vibration digital twin systems and methods for industrial environments | 716 |
| 6 | US7027773B1 | On/off keying node-to-node messaging transceiver network with dynamic routing and configuring | 619 |
| 7 | US20050154494A1 | Integrated building environment data system | 609 |
| 8 | US7468661B2 | System and method for monitoring and controlling remote devices | 536 |
| 9 | US7031880B1 | Method and apparatus for assessing performance of an environmental control system | 507 |
| 10 | US20050226201A1 | Node-to node messaging transceiver network with dynamec routing and configuring | 431 |
Citation counts inside this corpus favour older filings — read them as a signal of influence on the field, not of current commercial relevance.
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Browse MCP servers →What the numbers mean for a filing decision
Three read-throughs from the assignee ranking, the technology composition and the citation table.
Leadership is real but not a monopoly
The top 5 assignees combined hold 291 of the 1,124 records in scope, with the leader alone at 81. That leaves nearly three-quarters of filings spread across a long tail of the ranked leaders, so a newcomer is not filing into a field owned by one or two firms.
Control logic and connectivity are filed together
G05B (control & regulating systems) and H04L (digital transmission) each cover roughly a third of the 1,124 records, and their overlap suggests most serious filings pair a control claim with a networking or transmission claim rather than staying purely mechanical.
Volume has plateaued, not declined
Complete-year filings moved from 67 in 2021 to 66 in 2024, a -1% change, after a 2023 peak of 94. That reads as a market that has found its filing rate rather than one that is cooling off — 2025-2026 figures are still incomplete due to publication lag.
Old remote-monitoring patents still anchor the field
The most-cited record in this corpus, on monitoring and controlling remote devices, carries 2,093 citations — far above the rest of the table. Heavy citation to older remote-device patents signals that today's cloud and IoT-based building control claims still trace lineage back to basic remote monitoring and control architecture.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to building automation & controls patent landscape, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who is filing, and where the gaps sit
The ranked leaders span industrial controls incumbents, telecom-derived IoT filers and non-practising patent holding entities, alongside a long tail of single-digit filers.
One clear leader, no runaway second
The top-ranked assignee holds 81 of the 1,124 records, well ahead of fifth place at 37 and tenth place at 29 — a steep drop-off after the leader rather than a tight cluster at the top.
Recent-year filing is slowing across the board
Every tracked assignee with recent-year activity shows a year-over-year decline — the most active recent filer is still down 43% year over year, and several formerly active filers show zero filings in the latest year.
Co-assignment is rare and concentrated
Only 10 co-assignee pairs appear in the dataset, and the strongest pairings repeat the same corporate filer alongside named individual inventors — a pattern more consistent with inventor-assignment structuring than joint-venture filing.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Qualcomm Inc | 4 | -43% |
| May Patents Ltd | 3 | -79% |
| STRONG FORCE EE PORTFOLIO 2022 LLC | 1 | -93% |
| Siemens Industry Inc | 0 | — |
| STEALTHPATH INC | 0 | -100% |
| Siemens Building Technologies AG | 0 | — |
| Johnson Controls Technology Company | 0 | — |
| Schneider Electric Industries SAS | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to specific next steps depending on whether the goal is freedom-to-operate, whitespace filing, or monitoring a competitor.
Check freedom to operate against the leaders
With 25.9% of records held by the top 5 assignees, a clearance search should start with those portfolios before broadening to the long tail.
Run a freedom-to-operate check in EurekaExplore the under-claimed branches
Sub-areas like AI-based controller tuning and structural load monitoring show thinner filing density than the core G05B and H04L classes, and may support a first-mover claim.
Map white space in EurekaTrack momentum, not just volume
Recent-year declines across the most active filers may reflect publication lag rather than a real pullback — monitoring should continue past this data cut-off.
Set up assignee tracking in EurekaFrequently asked questions
The ranked leaders in this 1,124-record dataset show one clear top assignee with 81 records, followed by a steep drop to fifth place at 37 and tenth place at 29. The top 5 assignees combined hold 291 records, or 25.9% of all records in scope, and the top 10 combined hold 442, or 39.3%. That leaves a majority of filings spread across a long tail of smaller filers, so leadership in this field is concentrated but not a monopoly held by one or two companies.
Complete-year data shows filings held roughly flat, moving from 67 in 2021 to 66 in 2024, a -1% change, after peaking at 94 in 2023. Because patent publication lags filing by around 18 months, the lower counts shown for 2025 and 2026 are provisional and should not be read as a genuine slowdown. The fairer conclusion is that filing activity has plateaued at a high level rather than declined.
Control and regulating systems (IPC class G05B) and digital information transmission (H04L) are the two largest categories, covering 38.0% and 34.4% of the 1,124 records respectively. Electric data processing (G06F, 19.7%) and business/admin data processing (G06Q, 13.7%) follow, with AI-based computing (G06N) at a smaller 9.3% share, marking it as an emerging rather than dominant layer. Because a single record can carry multiple IPC classes, these percentages overlap and add up to more than 100%.
US10365619B2, filed by ABB Schweiz AG and granted 2019-07-30, covers technologies for individualized building automation using mobile computing devices that generate location- and time-based sensor readings — such as temperature and humidity from external sensors — which a building automation application server aggregates to generate a building system configuration. It sits within the control-parameter and equipment-state claim space that defines much of this dataset. Anyone building personalised, mobile-sensor-driven building control systems should review its specific claim language before designing a similar architecture.
Compared with the dense filing in core control (G05B) and connectivity (H04L) classes, sub-areas such as AI-based controller output tuning, structural load monitoring integration and cross-building energy demand orchestration show thinner claim density. This does not mean the underlying technology is unexplored, only that fewer patent claims currently occupy that specific space. A first filing there would need to combine a specific control parameter or equipment-state input with a clearly novel processing or orchestration step to stand apart from the existing control-systems prior art.
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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.