Distributed Object Storage Patents: Who Leads, Where Gaps Are 2026
Distributed object storage design patents: mapping who leads and where the claim space is still open
Concentrated at the top. The five most active filers account for 66.9% of all 5,320 records in scope, and the top ten reach 76.0% — a small group has shaped most of the claim space. Filings rose from 382 in 2017 to a peak of 564 in 2021, then eased to 431 by 2024, a -24% move over that span. 2025 and 2026 counts are still incomplete because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, so the most recent bars will keep rising as more records surface.
- 1PURE STORAGE INC47.3%
- 2AMAZON TECH INC12.9%
- 3NETAPP INC2.3%
- 4INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINE CORPORATION2.2%
- 5MICROSOFT TECHNOLOGY LICENSING LLC2.2%
See the full distributed object storage design analysis in Eureka
- The complete ranking, not just the top five
- Every IPC branch with its share of the corpus
- The most-cited records, and where claim space is still thin
Common questions about distributed object storage patents
Who holds the most patents in distributed object storage design?
One assignee leads the ranking with 2,518 of the 5,320 records in scope, well ahead of fifth place at 115 and tenth place at 79. The top five assignees combined account for 66.9% of all records, and the top ten reach 76.0%, so filing activity is heavily concentrated rather than spread evenly across the field. That said, the ranking covers 100 companies, and the remaining names file far less densely, forming a long tail rather than a second tier of comparable size.
Is patent filing in distributed object storage still growing?
Filing volume rose from 382 records in 2017 to a peak of 564 in 2021, then eased to 431 by 2024, a -24% change over that three-year span. Because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the 2025 and 2026 figures in any dataset are still incomplete and should not be read as evidence of a further decline. Based on complete-year data through 2024, the honest read is a cooling from a 2021 peak rather than a collapse.
What does US11228322B2 actually cover?
US11228322B2, assigned to EMC Ip Holding Company, claims a method of rebalancing a geographically diverse erasure-coded storage system as a side effect of re-encoding a coding chunk after the system scales out. It covers selecting a new erasure coding scheme, re-encoding an old chunk into a new one using a previously unprotected data chunk, and diversifying chunk distribution across zones as part of that re-encoding. Anyone designing a scale-out rebalancing mechanism that ties re-encoding to redistribution should review this claim set closely rather than assuming rebalancing and re-encoding can be claimed as fully separate steps.
Disclaimer. This analysis is based on Patsnap Eureka data drawn from a limited snapshot of global patent records and is provided for general information and reference only. Patent data carries inherent limitations — recent filings are under-counted because of publication lag, counts may be on a record or family basis, classification and applicant-name data may contain errors or duplicates, and the underlying search query defines the scope shown — so the analysis may be incomplete or inaccurate and may not reflect the full technology landscape.
Nothing here is an exhaustive prior-art, novelty, freedom-to-operate or validity search, nor does it constitute legal, financial or professional advice, and it should not be relied upon as such. Verify independently and review with qualified patent and legal professionals before acting on it.
Method: Filing trend and technology composition. Derived from a Patsnap search on Distributed Object Storage Design covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish. Every share divides by all records in scope. Data: Patsnap Eureka. See the full landscape report.