Composite Fan Blades Patents: Top Companies & Filing Trends 2026
- 82.0% of all 532 records sit with just five assignees — this is a field where the claim space at the top is almost fully occupied.
- Filings grew 233% from 2021 to 2024 (18 to 60 records), the last year in the trend that can be read as complete given publication lag.
- F01D turbine classifications cover 74.1% of records while woven-fabric and specific-plastic-article classes (D03D, B29D) sit under 6% each — a narrower band than the core rotor claims.
Filing growth compares 2021 (18 records) with 2024 (60) — 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 532 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this landscape covers
Composite fan blades and their containment casings sit at the intersection of aerostructure design and high-rate composite manufacturing: a blade that must survive bird strike and blade-out events, and a casing engineered to arrest a released blade without penetration. The 532 records in scope span blade release behaviour, penetration-resistant containment structures, abradable liners, resin transfer moulding processes and metallic leading-edge protection — the combination of mechanical design and process claims that defines this niche within turbine engineering.
Filing activity concentrates around gas-turbine and jet-propulsion classifications, with a smaller but persistent cluster of process and materials claims covering how the composite layup and metallic reinforcement are actually made, not just what shape they take.
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Filing trends and technology composition
The record set covers 2015 through the 2026 data cut-off, concentrated in a handful of IPC subclasses that map closely to the mechanical and manufacturing routes practitioners already recognise in this field.
A three-year filing surge, not yet cooling
Filings ran at 13 in 2017 and reached a peak of 60 in 2024, with the 2021-to-2024 span alone showing +233% growth (18 to 60 records). 2025 and 2026 figures are necessarily partial: publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so the most recent two years will fill in as later-filed applications publish.
Rotor-adjacent classes dominate, process classes trail
F01D (turbines & non-positive engines) appears on 74.1% of the 532 records, with F04D and F02C each covering more than a tenth. Manufacturing-process classes — B29C shaping of plastics at 11.3%, B32B layered products at 8.8% — and the narrower D03D woven fabrics and B29D specific plastic articles classes, each under 6%, sit well below the mechanical classes, indicating claim activity is denser on blade and casing structure than on the composite-forming process itself.
Shares are the percentage of the 532 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Composite Fan Blades and Containment Casings with Eureka
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Try EurekaThe patents shaping this field
Method for Producing a Near Net Shape Metallic Leading Edge
A method for the manufacture of a metallic protective device such as a metal leading edge for a component such as a gas turbine engine composite fan blade, an aluminum alloy fan blade, or other component requiring a metallic protective device. The method can be used to manufacture a near net shape metallic leading edge using a powder bed fusion process. Powder bed fusion technology utilizes a digital three dimensional computer aided design model of a component to manufacture the part with a layer by layer material build-up approach.Filed by HANLEY, GARY L., published 2017-03-23 as US20170081752A1.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US5141400A | Wide chord fan blade | 390 |
| 2 | US5279892A | Composite airfoil with woven insert | 220 |
| 3 | US6431837B1 | Stitched composite fan blade | 198 |
| 4 | US20110194941A1 | Co-cured sheath for composite blade | 136 |
| 5 | US20090202763A1 | Multidirectionally Reinforced Shape Woven Preforms for Composite Structures | 96 |
| 6 | US6843565B2 | Laser projection system to facilitate layup of complex composite shapes | 89 |
| 7 | EP0496550A1 | Wide chord fan blade | 76 |
| 8 | US5823739A | Containment case for a turbine engine | 72 |
| 9 | US6290455B1 | Contoured hardwall containment | 71 |
| 10 | US7841834B1 | Method and leading edge replacement insert for repairing a turbine engine blade | 70 |
Citation counts reflect influence within the searched corpus and skew toward older filings — a high count signals a foundational reference, not current relevance.
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Browse MCP servers →What the filing pattern tells a decision-maker
Three patterns stand out once the raw counts are set against each other: where claim density sits, how fast it built up, and how cited prior art frames the field's foundational moves.
The top of the field is nearly closed
Five assignees hold 436 of the 532 records in scope. A newcomer's freedom-to-operate analysis in this field is, in practice, an analysis of a handful of portfolios rather than a broad competitive field.
A surge that has not yet shown a peak
Filings rose from 18 in 2021 to 60 in 2024, the fastest three-year run in the trend. Because publication lag pushes recent filings into 2025 and 2026, this growth should not be read as having crested.
Wide-chord blade and woven-insert patents anchor the field
The most-cited records describe wide chord fan blade geometry and woven composite airfoil construction — these older filings are cited across the corpus as the baseline architecture that later process and materials claims build against.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to composite fan blades and containment casings, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who holds the claim space
The ranked list covers 31 companies; concentration is heavy enough that most freedom-to-operate work in this field starts and ends with the same small set of portfolios.
One portfolio dominates the ranking
The leading assignee's count alone exceeds the combined total of the sixth-through-thirty-first ranked companies, a gap that shapes how any new entrant should scope a design-around search.
A steep drop after the top ten
Past the top ten assignees, who together hold 93.2% of the 532 records, the remaining ranked companies each hold single-digit counts — a genuine long tail rather than a second tier of comparable size.
Even the leader's pace has slowed in the newest year
The top assignee filed 9 records in the latest year, down 80% year-on-year, while several other leading names show zero filings in that same window — consistent with publication lag rather than a genuine pullback.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| General Electric Company | 9 | -80% |
| Rolls-Royce plc | 0 | — |
| United Technologies Corporation | 0 | — |
| Albany International Techniweave, Inc. | 0 | — |
| Pratt & Whitney Canada Corp. | 0 | -100% |
| Hamilton Sundstrand Corporation | 0 | — |
| The Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University | 0 | — |
| Safran Aircraft Engines SAS (Snecma) | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
The counts above answer where filing has already happened. The next questions are about specific claims, specific assignees and where a new filing could actually land.
Map claims against the leading five portfolios
With 82.0% of records held by five assignees, a targeted claim chart against those five portfolios covers most of the field's real freedom-to-operate risk.
Run a claim comparison in EurekaTrack the under-claimed process branches
Manufacturing-process classes trail the mechanical classes by a wide margin — worth a fresh search before assuming resin transfer moulding or abradable liner claims are crowded.
Search white space in EurekaWatch the 2025–2026 publication window
Because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, the most interesting recent activity from top assignees has not fully surfaced yet.
Set an alert in EurekaCommon questions about this landscape
One assignee leads the ranked list with 190 of the 532 records in scope, well ahead of the next four companies that together bring the top five to 82.0% of all records. That concentration means a competitive read of this field is really a read of a handful of portfolios rather than a broad market. Fifth place holds 22 records and tenth place holds just 5, showing how steep the drop-off is past the leaders.
Yes, based on the complete years available: filings rose from 18 in 2021 to a peak of 60 in 2024, a 233% increase over that span. 2025 and 2026 figures in the trend are partial because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, so those two years will continue to fill in and should not be read as a slowdown. 2024 is the most recent year that can be treated as a complete count.
US20170081752A1 describes a method for manufacturing a near-net-shape metallic leading edge, such as one used on a composite or aluminum alloy fan blade, using a powder-bed fusion additive process guided by a digital CAD model. The claims center on the manufacturing method itself — the layer-by-layer build-up approach — rather than on the leading edge's shape or material composition in isolation. Anyone developing an additive route to metallic leading-edge protection on a fan blade should review this filing's process claims specifically, not just its stated end use.
The core mechanical classes — F01D turbines and F02C gas-turbine plants — are heavily claimed, together covering the large majority of the 532 records. Manufacturing-process classes trail well behind: B29C shaping of plastics sits at 11.3% of records and the narrower woven-fabric (D03D) and specific-plastic-article (B29D) classes sit under 6% each. That gap suggests process-specific claims around resin transfer moulding cycle time, abradable liner wear sensing, and additive repair of metallic leading edges are comparatively under-claimed relative to blade and casing structure claims.
The United States receives the largest share of filings in this dataset at 256 records, followed by the European Patent Office at 129 and the United Kingdom at 44. Germany, Austria and WIPO's PCT route each account for smaller but still meaningful counts. This distribution reflects where the major aerospace engine manufacturers file first and where they seek broader regional or international protection alongside their home jurisdiction.
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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.