Digital Pathology Patents: Who Leads, Where the Gaps Are 2026
- Filings have cooled, not grown. activity peaked in 2018 at 6 families and had fallen to 1 by the 2022 midpoint of the window, a flat-to-declining trend rather than the growth curve the field's commercial buzz might suggest.
- Optics still dominates the claim language. G02B (optical elements & systems) appears in 52 of 55 records, meaning nearly every filing anchors its claims in autofocus, illumination or imaging-path hardware rather than pure software processing.
- Two named inventors anchor the densest filing cluster. HULSKEN BAS and STALLINGA SJOERD co-file together 6 times, the strongest co-assignee pair in the dataset, pointing to a concentrated Philips-linked autofocus and calibration program.
What this patent set covers
This landscape covers patent families at the intersection of digital pathology and whole slide imaging, filtered to filings that combine pathology scanning terminology with specific technical claims around scan speed, color standardization, focus quality, AI-assisted diagnosis or large-image storage. The dataset spans 2015 to 2026 and holds 55 published families, classified under optical systems (G02B), pictorial communication (H04N), material analysis (G01N) and healthcare informatics (G16H) codes.
Because publication typically lags filing by around eighteen months, the most recent years in any trend chart understate real filing activity; treat the last one to two years as provisional rather than final.
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Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 55-family dataset: how filing volume has moved year on year, and which IPC subclasses carry the technical weight of the claims.
A peak in 2018, then a decline
Filings rose to 4 in 2017 and peaked at 6 in 2018 before easing off; by the 2022 midpoint the annual count had dropped to 1, and the trend through the most recent (partial) year shows no rebound. This is a mature filing pattern, not an emerging one.
Optics carries the claims
G02B (optical elements & systems) touches 52 of 55 records, far ahead of H04N (pictorial communication, 21) and G01N (material analysis, 9). Software-adjacent codes — G16H healthcare informatics, G06T image processing, G06N AI models — appear in single digits, meaning the bulk of enforceable claim scope in this dataset sits in scanning hardware and optical-path design rather than in downstream AI or data-handling layers.
Shares are the percentage of the 55 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Digital Pathology and Whole Slide Imaging with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about digital pathology and whole slide imaging and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe filings other applicants had to design around
Calibration slide for digital pathology (US20200264096A1, Koninklijke Philips)
The present invention relates to digital pathology. In order to improve uniformity at microscopic level and to enhance stability in time for color calibration, a calibration slide is provided for a digital pathology scanning microscope. The calibration slide comprises a substrate and a pixel layout comprising a plurality of spaced apart metal nanostructures arranged on a surface of the substrate. The substrate is optically transparent. The metal nanostructures are arranged to produce plasmon resonances for generating a color image under a bright-field illumination.Abstract text as filed; claim scope may be narrower than the abstract suggests.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | WO2011161594A1 | Autofocus based on differential measurements | 25 |
| 2 | US20200400930A1 | Digital pathology scanning interface and workflow | 17 |
| 3 | US20130271594A1 | Achieving focus in a digital pathology system | 17 |
| 4 | WO2017109175A1 | Calibration slide for digital pathology | 16 |
| 5 | WO2011145016A1 | Autofocus imaging | 15 |
| 6 | US8456522B2 | Achieving focus in a digital pathology system | 12 |
| 7 | US20110141263A1 | Achieving Focus in a Digital Pathology System | 8 |
| 8 | CN108474874A | 用于数字病理学的校准载玻片 | 7 |
| 9 | US9213177B2 | Achieving focus in a digital pathology system | 7 |
| 10 | US20200264096A1 | Calibration slide for digital pathology | 6 |
Citation counts accumulate over time, so older filings naturally lead; read them as markers of influence on subsequent filers, not as a ranking of current technical importance.
Patent titles are shown in the language they were filed in, not translated, so that each record stays verifiable against the original filing — a translated title will not match in Eureka or in any national register. Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Browse MCP servers →What the filing pattern says about the field
Reading volume, citations and IPC spread together points to a field where the hardware calibration problem attracted early, concentrated attention and has since gone quiet.
The wave has already passed
The dataset's peak year, 2018, sits early in the coverage window. Filing volume more than halved by the midpoint of the period and has not recovered, which is consistent with a technical problem — color and focus calibration — that a small number of players solved early and then defended rather than kept expanding.
Autofocus set the baseline
The most-cited record in the set addresses autofocus via differential measurement, and three of the five most-cited filings deal directly with focus quality. Later filers had to cite around this baseline, which suggests autofocus is the most thoroughly staked-out sub-problem in the field.
Hardware, not software, holds the claims
Only a handful of records classify under G16H, G06T or G06N. The imaging path — lenses, illumination, autofocus mechanics — is where the enforceable claim language actually sits, even in filings whose abstracts foreground AI-assisted diagnosis.
Filing is US- and Europe-led with a growing India route
The United States and European Patent Office together account for the majority of receiving-office activity, with India as a distinct third venue and WIPO PCT filings used for broader coverage. Canada and Austria appear only marginally.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to digital pathology and whole slide imaging, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who holds the ground, and where it is open
A small cluster of named inventors and one corporate assignee anchor the densest filing activity; no assignee in the set shows filings in the most recent year, reinforcing the flat trend seen above.
Hulsken and Stallinga anchor the calibration work
HULSKEN BAS and STALLINGA SJOERD co-file together six times, the strongest pairing among only four identified co-assignee relationships in the dataset — a tightly held program rather than a broad multi-team effort.
Philips ties directly to the named inventors
Koninklijke Philips appears paired with both Hulsken and Stallinga individually, connecting the corporate assignee record to the inventor-level cluster and suggesting the calibration-slide and autofocus work was run as an internal, named-inventor program rather than acquired.
No assignee shows current-year activity
Every assignee tracked for recent-year momentum, including the corporate leaders and the named inventors, shows zero filings in the latest year. Combined with the declining trend since 2018, this points to a field where the foundational IP has been staked and few new entrants are filing.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Koninklijke Philips N.V. | 0 | — |
| HURON TECH INT INC | 0 | — |
| HULSKEN BAS | 0 | — |
| STALLINGA SJOERD | 0 | — |
| Ventana Medical Systems, Inc. | 0 | — |
| APERIO TECHNOLOGIES INC | 0 | — |
| F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd | 0 | — |
| VYUHA MED DATA PVT LTD | 0 | -100% |
Where to take this
The filing data points to a field with a settled hardware core and thinner coverage in software-adjacent layers. Two directions follow from that.
Check freedom-to-operate on autofocus and calibration
With the densest citation activity and the tightest co-assignee cluster both sitting on focus quality and color calibration, any new scanner design should clear these claims before committing to a hardware path.
Run a freedom-to-operate check in EurekaExplore the AI-assisted diagnosis and storage gaps
G16H, G06T and G06N codes appear in only single digits despite abstracts referencing AI-assisted diagnosis, suggesting the software and large-image storage layers are comparatively open for new claims.
Explore white space in EurekaCommon questions on digital pathology patents
In this dataset, Koninklijke Philips (referred to in some records as Koninklijke Philips N.V.) is the clearest corporate assignee, linked directly to named inventors HULSKEN BAS and STALLINGA SJOERD who co-file together more than any other pair in the set. Other assignees appear in the ranking but with less concentrated co-filing activity. No single company holds a dominant share of all 55 families, so the picture is one of a lead cluster plus a longer tail rather than one company controlling the field.
No, not based on this dataset. Filings peaked at 6 in 2018, dropped to 1 by the 2022 midpoint of the coverage window, and every tracked assignee shows zero filings in the most recent year. Because publication lags filing by roughly eighteen months, the very last year or two should be read as incomplete, but the multi-year decline before that point is real and not an artefact of the lag.
The large majority of records classify under G02B, optical elements and systems, covering autofocus, illumination and the imaging path of the scanner itself. Smaller but meaningful shares sit in H04N (pictorial communication) and G01N (material analysis). Software-facing categories such as healthcare informatics, image data processing and AI-based computing appear in only a handful of records each, even though abstracts often reference AI-assisted diagnosis.
The clearest gaps sit in the branches that abstracts mention but claims rarely cover in depth: AI-assisted diagnostic overlays, large whole-slide-image storage architecture, and cross-scanner color standardization protocols. These areas show thin representation in the IPC composition relative to the dense optical and autofocus claim coverage, suggesting room for new filings that do not immediately run into the established hardware cluster.
This Philips filing claims a specific calibration-slide design using spaced metal nanostructures that generate plasmon-resonance color signals for bright-field color calibration. Anyone building a scanner with an automated color-calibration step should check this claim scope carefully, since it is narrow and structural rather than a broad method claim, which typically leaves room for calibration approaches using different substrate or pattern designs. It sits alongside a cluster of related Philips calibration-slide filings, so a single design-around may not clear the whole family.
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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.