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Run your analysis now →https://www.patsnap.com/resources/blog/rd-blog/configuration-and-policy-management-patent-landscape/ · Patsnap · data cut-off 2026-07-31 · downloaded from the live page
Patent Landscape · Container OrchestrationConfiguration and Policy Management Patents: Who Leads and Where the Field Is Heading
- 38.3% concentration. The five leading assignees account for 254 of 664 records in scope — claim space at the top is dense before you even open the ranking.
- Filing growth reversed. Annual filings fell from 83 in 2021 to 57 in 2024, a 31% decline over that three-year span, after peaking at 86 in 2023.
- Two IPC classes dominate. H04L and G06F together tag roughly half of all 664 records, while AI-adjacent classification (G06N) touches just 1.4%.
664
Published Records
38%
Top-5 Share of All Records
-31%
Filing Growth 2021→2024
US
Leading Jurisdiction
Filing growth compares 2021 (83 records) with 2024 (57) — 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 664 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
Published byPatsnap Research··7 min readSourced from Patsnap Eureka
Overview
What this dataset covers
This landscape tracks 664 published records filed against a search combining declarative configuration, configuration drift detection and admission control with policy validation, rollback, conflict resolution, desired state and cluster consistency. The scope spans 2015 to the 2026-07-31 cut-off, capturing the period in which Kubernetes-style orchestration moved policy enforcement and drift detection from operational tooling into claimed invention. Publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so the final one or two years in any trend chart will always look thinner than they eventually turn out to be.
Filing activity in this space is not evenly spread: a handful of infrastructure and licensing-heavy assignees hold a disproportionate share of the record count, while receiving-office data shows the United States dominating filing venue by a wide margin over Europe, WIPO and other national offices.
Filing activity, 2015–2026
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee ranking and totals. Derived from a Patsnap search on Configuration and Policy Management covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
The data
Filing trends and technology composition
The two views below — annual filing volume and IPC subclass composition — show a field that grew quickly through the early 2020s, cooled after 2023, and remains anchored in networking and general data-processing classifications rather than AI-specific ones.
Filing trend, 2017–2026
Filings rose from 35 in 2017 to a peak of 86 in 2023, then declined to 57 by 2024 — a 31% drop across the 2021–2024 window. The 2025 and 2026 figures are still filling in due to publication lag and should not be read as a continued fall.
Technology composition by IPC subclass
H04L (digital information transmission) tags 52.9% of the 664 records and G06F (electric digital data processing) tags 49.1%, confirming that most inventions here sit at the intersection of network protocol and data-processing claims. Wireless networking (H04W) appears in 27.1% of records, while video (H04N), general transmission (H04B), business processing (G06Q), AI-based computing (G06N) and multiplexing (H04J) each cover single-digit shares — these are the classes to check for white space rather than crowding.
Shares are the percentage of the 664 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Filing trend and technology composition. Derived from a Patsnap search on Configuration and Policy Management covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.
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Representative and most-cited filings
Representative filing
US10606569B2 — Declarative configuration elements
MICROSOFT TECHNOLOGY LICENSING, LLC
Systems and methods for desired state configuration (DSC) are disclosed. DSC provides the ability to perform declarative configuration natively within a shell language and to use early-bound schematized data constructs embedded in a late-bound shell language. This allows declarative programming elements to be incorporated into imperative languages, such as scripts for configuration management. Script may combine the power of an imperative shell language with the ease of use of a declarative language and may use both imperative and declarative syntax in the same language.Filed by Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC; published 2020-03-31.
Most-cited records in scope
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US6502131B1 | Directory enabled policy management tool for intelligent traffic management | 1,233 |
| 2 | US6078953A | System and method for monitoring quality of service over network | 684 |
| 3 | US20140086177A1 | End-to-end architecture, API framework, discovery, and access in a virtualized network | 552 |
| 4 | US6578077B1 | Traffic monitoring tool for bandwidth management | 376 |
| 5 | US8781442B1 | Personal assistance safety systems and methods | 352 |
| 6 | US20220014963A1 | Reinforcement learning for multi-access traffic management | 335 |
| 7 | US6816903B1 | Directory enabled policy management tool for intelligent traffic management | 329 |
| 8 | US6137777A | Control tool for bandwidth management | 271 |
| 9 | US7240015B1 | Policy representations and mechanisms for the control of software | 260 |
| 10 | US20050091346A1 | Settings management infrastructure | 252 |
Citation counts reflect influence within the searched corpus and skew toward older filings; treat them as a signal of prior-art density, not of current commercial relevance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Citation counts and representative records. Derived from a Patsnap search on Configuration and Policy Management covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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What the numbers mean for strategy
Three patterns matter most for anyone deciding where to file or where to look for prior art: concentration at the top, a post-peak filing slowdown, and a technology mix still centred on transmission and general data processing rather than AI-driven policy engines.
Concentration
38.3%
of 664 records held by top 5 assignees
The top of the field is crowded
The five leading assignees combined account for 254 of the 664 records in scope, and the top ten reach 57.1% (379 records). New entrants filing broad declarative-configuration or admission-control claims will run into dense prior art from incumbents with large licensing and infrastructure portfolios.
Source: assignee ranking, 664 records
Momentum
-31%
filings 2021 → 2024
Growth peaked in 2023, then eased
Annual filings rose from 35 in 2017 to a peak of 86 in 2023, then fell to 57 by 2024 — a 31% decline over the three-year window. Because publication lags filing by about 18 months, 2025–2026 figures are still incomplete and should not be read as confirming further decline.
Source: filing trend, 2017–2026
Technology mix
1.4%
of records tagged G06N (AI-based computing)
Policy logic is still mostly rule-based, not model-driven
H04L and G06F cover roughly half of all records each, while G06N — AI-based computing — appears in only 1.4% of the 664 records. Declarative and policy-conflict claims in this corpus are overwhelmingly framed as protocol and data-processing logic rather than machine-learning-driven policy engines.
Source: IPC composition, 664 records
Filing venue
396
US-filed records
Filing activity concentrates in the US
The United States receives 396 of the tracked filings, well ahead of the European Patent Office (73), WIPO/PCT (70), India (33), Germany (16) and the United Kingdom (15). Strategies built solely around US freedom-to-operate should still check EPO and PCT filings before assuming clear space.
Source: receiving-office data
Eureka AI Agent
Looking for what nobody has claimed yet?
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to configuration and policy management, with the prior art for and against each one.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Co-assignee relationships and derived observations. Derived from a Patsnap search on Configuration and Policy Management covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
Players
Who is filing, and what is left open
The ranked leaders in this dataset span cloud infrastructure, telecom licensing and semiconductor manufacturing — a mix that reflects how configuration and policy management sits at the junction of network operations and enterprise software rather than any single vertical.
Leader
77
records, leading assignee
A clear single leader, then a steep drop
The leading assignee holds 77 records, well ahead of fifth place at 40 and tenth place at 18. That gap suggests one organisation built a durable filing programme around declarative configuration and desired-state claims well before the rest of the field caught up.
Source: assignee ranking
Long tail
100
companies in the ranked list
A long tail beyond the top ten
The ranking returned by the dataset covers 100 companies, and the top ten already account for 57.1% of all 664 records — meaning the remaining 90-plus ranked assignees share less than half the field between them, mostly in single- or low-digit filing counts.
Source: assignee ranking, 664 records
Co-filing
6
co-assignee pairs identified
Collaboration is rare and narrow
Only 6 co-assignee pairs appear in the dataset, and the strongest is an internal split between a parent company and its India-based software development arm. Cross-company joint filing is not a meaningful pattern here — most assignees file solo.
Source: co-assignee pairs
Recent filing momentum by assignee
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Oracle International Corporation | 1 | -92% |
| VMware, Inc. | 0 | — |
| Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC | 0 | — |
| Signalworks Broadband, Inc. | 0 | — |
| InterDigital Patent Holdings, Inc. | 0 | -100% |
| Cisco Technology, Inc. | 0 | -100% |
| Intel Corporation | 0 | — |
| International Business Machines Corporation | 0 | -100% |
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee-level momentum. Derived from a Patsnap search on Configuration and Policy Management covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
What's next
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to a field that is top-heavy in filings but still open in AI-driven policy logic and several transmission-adjacent branches. Two follow-ups make sense before committing a filing or freedom-to-operate budget.
Run a freedom-to-operate check against the top ten
With 57.1% of all 664 records held by ten assignees, any new declarative-configuration or admission-control claim should be checked against their specific claim scope before drafting.
Explore assignee claims in EurekaProbe the G06N and H04Q-adjacent white space
AI-based computing classification (G06N) touches just 1.4% of records — a first claim combining policy-conflict detection with model-driven decisioning has comparatively little prior art to design around.
Map white space in EurekaSource: Patsnap Eureka. Forward-looking reading of the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Configuration and Policy Management covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
FAQ
Common questions about this landscape
One assignee leads the ranked list with 77 records, noticeably ahead of the rest of the field — fifth place holds 40 and tenth place holds 18. Together the top five assignees account for 254 of the 664 records in scope, or 38.3% of the field, meaning a small group of companies controls a disproportionate share of claimed invention here. The remaining 90-plus ranked assignees each hold much smaller counts, forming a long tail of single- or low-digit filers.
Filings grew steadily from 35 in 2017 to a peak of 86 in 2023, then fell to 57 by 2024 — a 31% decline across that three-year span. Because publication typically lags actual filing by around 18 months, the 2025 and 2026 counts in any dataset are still incomplete and understate real activity. The honest read is a field that peaked in 2023 and cooled somewhat by 2024, not one in freefall.
Digital information transmission (H04L) and general electric data processing (G06F) are the two largest IPC classes, tagging 52.9% and 49.1% of the 664 records respectively — many filings sit across both. Wireless networking (H04W) covers 27.1% of records, while video, general transmission, business-process and AI-based computing classes each account for a few percent or less. This mix shows the field is still framed mainly as network-protocol and data-processing invention rather than AI-native policy engines.
US10606569B2, assigned to Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC and published 2020-03-31, claims systems and methods for desired state configuration (DSC) — specifically the ability to embed early-bound, schematized declarative data constructs inside a late-bound imperative shell language. In practice this covers scripts that mix imperative and declarative syntax for configuration management, letting a shell language carry declarative configuration elements natively. Anyone building a configuration tool that lets users declare desired state inside an otherwise procedural scripting language should review this claim scope closely.
The clearest under-claimed branches, based on IPC share against the 664-record base, are AI-based computing (G06N, 1.4%), multiplex communication (H04J, 1.2%), business-process admission control (G06Q, 2.0%) and general transmission-layer rollback signalling (H04B, 2.1%). These are not zero-filing areas, but their low share relative to H04L and G06F suggests less-developed prior art. A first claim combining policy-conflict detection with model-driven decisioning, for example, would have comparatively little to design around today.
Answers are grounded in the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Configuration and Policy Management covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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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.