Crane Automation Patents: Who Leads, Where the Gaps Are 2026
- 56.3% of all 135 records sit with just five assignees, so most of the working claim space in this dataset is already occupied by a small group of filers.
- Filings peaked in 2022 at 11 and fell -89% from 2021 (9) to 2024 (1) — the last year that can be read as complete given an 18-month publication lag.
- G01S positioning appears in 34.1% of records second only to B66C crane mechanics (60.7%), showing how much of this field is now a sensing and localisation problem, not a mechanical one.
Filing growth compares 2021 (9 records) with 2024 (1) — 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 135 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this dataset covers
This landscape draws on 135 published records filed against automated stacking cranes, quay cranes and container spreaders, filtered to documents that also claim positioning accuracy, twistlock actuation, collision detection, remote operation, landing detection or laser profiling. The scope sits at the intersection of heavy lifting mechanics and the sensing stack that makes unmanned operation possible — not general crane design or generic robotics.
Coverage runs from 2015 through the 2026-07-31 cut-off, giving a full decade to trace how mechanical crane patents (B66C) have been joined, and in places overtaken in filing volume, by positioning and radar/sonar claims (G01S). The most recent one to two years of data will always look thinner than they eventually turn out to be, because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months.
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Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 135 records: how filing activity has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses the claims actually sit in.
A sharp rise, then a step down
Filings were essentially flat through 2017, built to a peak of 11 in 2022, then dropped -89% from 9 in 2021 to 1 in 2024 — the last year in the series with a reasonably complete publication record. Readings for 2025 and 2026 will fill in further as later-filed applications publish, so they should not yet be read as a continued decline.
Mechanics still leads, but positioning is close behind
B66C (cranes and hoists) appears on 60.7% of the 135 records, confirming this is still fundamentally crane-mechanism IP. G01S (radar, sonar and positioning) follows at 34.1%, well ahead of B65G conveying (22.2%) and B65D containers (11.1%) — a sign that sensing and localisation claims now carry as much competitive weight as the crane structure itself. Because records can carry multiple classes, these shares do not sum to 100%.
Shares are the percentage of the 135 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Crane Automation and Container Handling with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about crane automation and container handling and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe most-cited prior art and a recent representative filing
Point-cloud navigation for quay crane areas (EP4621444A1)
Filed by Shanghai Westwell Technology, this application describes navigating a quay crane area using GPS-guided approach followed by continuous spatial scanning that builds a point-cloud map of the cargo ship and surrounding area. The system matches point-cloud objects against GPS positioning data in real time and falls back to point-cloud-based navigation when GPS signal strength drops below a preset threshold.Published 2025-09-24 — recent enough that its citation count and prosecution status are still developing.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US4973219A | Grid rail container transport and storage system | 258 |
| 2 | US20060251498A1 | System and process for improving container flow in a port facility | 144 |
| 3 | US20180170720A1 | Load transport by means of load handling equipment | 40 |
| 4 | US20120092643A1 | System for the identification and/or location determination of a container handling machine | 40 |
| 5 | US20100109947A1 | System and method for positioning a GPS device | 40 |
| 6 | WO2002014202A1 | Remote container handling system | 36 |
| 7 | US7987017B2 | System and process for improving container flow in a port facility | 31 |
| 8 | US6648156B1 | Method for handling containers and a means to carry out a method for selecting a desired position on a stacki… | 31 |
| 9 | WO2016001481A1 | Load transport by means of load handling equipment | 30 |
| 10 | WO2006093744A2 | System and process for improving container flow in a port facility | 24 |
Citation counts favour older documents that have had more time to accumulate citations inside this corpus; treat them as a signal of influence on the field, not as evidence of current commercial relevance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Browse MCP servers →What the concentration and citation data suggest
Reading the ranking and the citation table together points to where claim space is dense and where influence sits with older, foundational filings.
Filing is concentrated at the top
Five assignees account for 56.3% of all 135 records in scope, and the top 10 extend that to 76.3%. A leader sitting well ahead of the field at 22 records, against a fifth-place figure of 8, points to a small group that has built out broad claim coverage while a long tail files single or occasional records.
Foundational grid-rail and port-flow patents still anchor the field
The most-cited record in this set, on grid-rail container transport and storage, carries 258 citations; a port-facility container-flow patent follows at 144. Both predate the current wave of sensing-driven filings, which is typical: citation counts inside a searched corpus accumulate over time and so favour older documents regardless of present-day relevance.
Positioning and sensing claims now rival crane mechanics
B66C crane-mechanism claims still lead at 60.7% of records, but G01S positioning and radar/sonar claims appear on over a third of the dataset. That is a meaningfully different technology mix from a purely mechanical crane landscape, and it means new entrants need freedom-to-operate analysis on sensing claims as much as on lifting hardware.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to crane automation and container handling, with the prior art for and against each one.
| Assignee | Co-assignee | Shared families |
|---|---|---|
| Konecranes Oyj | SAMPO MIKKO | 1 |
| Konecranes Oyj | RINTANEN KARI | 1 |
| ABB AB | JOHANSSON | 1 |
| ABB AB | BRYFORS UNO | 1 |
| Maersk Ltd. | MCCARTHY EDWARD | 1 |
| Maersk Ltd. | HUDSON RICHARD L | 1 |
| Maersk Ltd. | BUZZONI GUY ALLEN | 1 |
| PSA CORP | SHUM SIEW HUNG | 1 |
Only 9 co-assignee pairs appear across the dataset, and the strongest pairs link a single company to individual named inventors rather than to other corporate assignees — this is a field of largely independent filers, not joint development.
Who is filing, and what is still open
The ranked assignee list is dominated by established crane and terminal-equipment manufacturers, with newer entrants filing on the sensing and software side of automation.
A clear leader ahead of the pack
The top-ranked assignee holds 22 of the 135 records in scope, well ahead of the fifth-place figure of 8 and the tenth-place figure of 4. That gap suggests a durable filing programme rather than a one-off cluster of applications.
Momentum has thinned across the board
Among the assignees tracked for recent-year momentum, only one shows any activity in the latest year, and it is a single record. The others, including several of the largest historical filers, show zero in the latest year — consistent with the broader publication lag rather than a genuine stop in R&D.
Europe and the US lead filing office volume
Europe (EPO) accounts for 27 filings and the United States 24, with China (13), Japan (12), WIPO/PCT (11) and Australia (7) following. That spread points to a field prosecuted across multiple major jurisdictions rather than concentrated in one home market.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Shanghai Zhenhua Heavy Industries Co., Ltd. | 1 | — |
| Elme Spreader AB | 0 | — |
| Konecranes Global Oy | 0 | — |
| Konecranes Finland Oy | 0 | — |
| Konecranes Oyj | 0 | — |
| ABB AB | 0 | — |
| RAM SMAG Elevatoring Technologies Pte Ltd | 0 | — |
| Maersk Ltd. | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
This page maps the field at a point in time. Turning it into a filing or freedom-to-operate decision means going deeper on the specific claims that sit closest to your own technical route.
Check freedom-to-operate against the leader's portfolio
With one assignee holding 22 of 135 records, any new filing on positioning accuracy or twistlock actuation should be checked claim-by-claim against that portfolio before drafting.
Explore assignee portfolios in EurekaTrack the under-claimed sensing branches
Laser profiling, landing detection and remote-operation latency sit at lower filing density than core crane mechanics — worth monitoring for new entrants before the space fills in.
Set up monitoring in EurekaRead the foundational prior art before drafting
The two most-cited records in this set, on grid-rail transport and port container flow, still anchor citation chains across newer filings and are worth reading in full before claim drafting.
Pull full-text prior art in EurekaCommon questions on crane automation patents
In this dataset of 135 records, filing is led by a single assignee holding 22 records, well ahead of the fifth-ranked assignee at 8 and the tenth at 4. The top 5 assignees together hold 56.3% of all 135 records, and the top 10 extend that to 76.3%. Names include established crane and terminal-equipment manufacturers alongside newer software-and-sensing entrants; consult the ranked table on this page for the exact order, since it is drawn directly from the underlying data rather than summarised here.
Filing peaked at 11 records in 2022 and then fell sharply, down -89% from 9 filings in 2021 to 1 in 2024, the most recent year that can be treated as reasonably complete. Because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the 2025 and 2026 figures in any such dataset will understate actual filing activity and should not be read as a genuine slowdown yet. A clearer read on the current trajectory will only be possible once another one to two years of publications have caught up.
Crane and hoist mechanics (IPC class B66C) appear on 60.7% of the 135 records in this dataset, making it the largest single category by a wide margin. Positioning, radar and sonar technology (G01S) follows at 34.1%, ahead of conveying and material handling (B65G) at 22.2% and container/packaging claims (B65D) at 11.1%. Because a single record can carry multiple IPC codes, these percentages add up to more than 100%, and the presence of G01S at over a third of records signals that sensing and localisation are now central to how this field is claimed, not a peripheral add-on to crane hardware.
EP4621444A1 was filed by Shanghai Westwell Technology and published 2025-09-24, describing a point-cloud-based navigation method for a quay crane area. It combines an initial GPS-guided approach path with continuous spatial scanning that builds a point-cloud map of the cargo ship and surroundings, matching point-cloud objects to GPS data in real time and switching to point-cloud-only navigation if GPS signal strength drops below a set threshold. As a filing from 2025, it is too recent to have accumulated meaningful citation activity, so its influence on the field is not yet measurable from citation counts alone.
Several branches show up in this dataset at noticeably lower density than core crane mechanics or positioning claims, including twistlock actuation sensing, laser profiling for container landing, spreader-mounted collision detection, remote-operation latency compensation, and robotic manipulator integration under IPC class B25J, which appears on only 6.7% of records. Lower filing density in a branch means less occupied claim space, which can translate into more freedom to file narrowly scoped, defensible claims there. It does not mean the technology is unimportant, only that fewer parties have staked out claims in it so far within this corpus.
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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.