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Run your analysis now →https://www.patsnap.com/resources/blog/rd-blog/drug-eluting-stent-biocompatible-materials-patent-landscape/ · Patsnap · data cut-off 2026-07-31 · downloaded from the live page
Patent Landscape · Biomedical DevicesDrug-Eluting Stent Biocompatible Material Patents
- Filing has cooled since its 2018 peak. 27 families filed that year against a flat-to-declining trend through the 2022 midpoint of just 4, with the latest full year showing no clear recovery.
- Sterilising and implant classes dominate the claim space. A61L and A61F cover 277 and 250 records respectively, out of 426 total families, while polymer-chemistry classes like C08G and C08B sit an order of magnitude lower.
- No single assignee is filing at pace right now. Every assignee tracked for recent-year momentum, including established device makers, shows zero filings in the latest year, consistent with the sector-wide slowdown.
426
Published Records
56%
Top-5 Share of All Records
-67%
3-Yr Growth (lag-adjusted)
US
Leading Jurisdiction
Published byPatsnap Research··7 min readSourced from Patsnap Eureka
Overview
What this landscape covers
This landscape tracks 426 patent families published between 2015 and mid-2026 that combine drug-eluting or coated stent claims with biocompatible, biodegradable-polymer, or hemocompatible-surface material claims. The search deliberately pairs device-level stent language with materials-level coating language, so the result set skews toward filings that treat the coating or surface chemistry as the inventive core rather than the stent mechanics.
Filing activity peaked in 2018 and has not returned to that level since; because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the most recent year in the trend is understated and should be read as a floor, not a ceiling.
Filing activity, 2017-2026
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee ranking and totals. Derived from a Patsnap search on Drug-Eluting Stent Biocompatible Materials 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 Numbers
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 426 families: when the claims were filed, and which IPC subclasses they sit in. Both point to a field that expanded fast around 2018 and has since concentrated on sterilisation and implant-structure claims rather than new polymer chemistry.
A 2018 peak followed by a flat-to-declining run
From 8 families in 2017, filings climbed to a peak of 27 in 2018, then eased back toward a midpoint of 4 in 2022. The pattern is consistent with an early wave of coating and hemocompatibility claims that has since been substantially staked out.
Sterilisation and implant classes carry the volume
A61L (sterilising and disinfecting) and A61F (implants and prostheses) account for 277 and 250 records respectively, well ahead of A61K medicinal-preparation claims at 88. Polymer-specific classes, C09D coatings, C08G condensation polymers, C08B polysaccharides and C08L polymer compositions, each sit between 22 and 29 records, suggesting the underlying polymer chemistry is claimed far less densely than the device and sterilisation layers built on top of it.
Shares are the percentage of the 426 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 Drug-Eluting Stent Biocompatible Materials covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.
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The prior art everyone in this space cites
Representative Filing
US20160074562A1 — Drug eluting stent with a biodegradable release layer attached with electro-grafted primer coating
ALCHIMEDICS
The present invention provides a drug eluting stent including a metallic stent framework, an electro-grafted primer coating disposed on the stent framework; and a biodegradable polymer coating hosting a drug disposed on the electro-grafted primer coating and a method of manufacturing said biodegradable drug eluting stent.Filed by Alchimedics; the electro-grafted primer layer between metal framework and biodegradable drug-loaded coating is the structural detail worth checking against any new adhesion-layer approach.
Most-cited records in the corpus
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US5980551A | Composition and method for making a biodegradable drug delivery stent | 406 |
| 2 | US7163715B1 | Spray processing of porous medical devices | 287 |
| 3 | US7105018B1 | Drug-eluting stent cover and method of use | 225 |
| 4 | US20050036946A1 | Radio-opaque compounds, compositions containing same and methods of their synthesis and use | 214 |
| 5 | US20040234575A1 | Medical products comprising a haemocompatible coating, production and use thereof | 199 |
| 6 | US20050176678A1 | Compounds and method for coating surfaces in a haemocompatibe manner | 195 |
| 7 | US20050129731A1 | Biocompatible, biostable coating of medical surfaces | 193 |
| 8 | US7462192B2 | Atraumatic stent with reduced deployment force, method for making the same and method and apparatus for deplo… | 189 |
| 9 | US20080038307A1 | Biocompatible Coating, Method, and Use of Medical Surfaces | 186 |
| 10 | US20040117008A1 | Medical implants containing FK506 (tacrolimus), methods of making and methods of use thereof | 162 |
Citation counts inside a searched corpus favour older records; treat these as markers of influence on the field's vocabulary, not as evidence 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 Drug-Eluting Stent Biocompatible Materials 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 filing strategy
The composition and trend data point to a field where the device-level claim space is dense but the underlying polymer chemistry is comparatively open.
Filing Momentum
27 → 4
peak 2018 to 2022 midpoint
The early land-grab is largely over
Filings peaked in 2018 and had fallen to a midpoint of 4 by 2022, with the most recent tracked year showing no assignee filing at all. New entrants are filing into a space where the obvious claim territory around drug-eluting coatings and hemocompatible surfaces has already been marked out.
Read alongside the 18-month publication lag before assuming the field is dead.
Claim Concentration
277 / 426
records touching A61L
Sterilisation claims dominate, not polymer chemistry
A61L sterilising and disinfecting claims appear in the majority of records, more than double the count in any single polymer-chemistry class. That imbalance suggests firms have spent more claim effort protecting how coatings are sterilised and processed than on the base polymer compositions themselves.
Polymer-specific subclasses (C08G, C08B, C08L) each sit near 25 records.
Assignee Activity
0 in latest year
across every tracked assignee
No incumbent is currently filing at pace
Recent-year momentum figures show zero filings in the latest tracked year across every assignee reviewed, including established cardiovascular device makers. That is a sector-wide pause rather than a single company stepping back.
Confirm against the 18-month lag before reading this as abandonment.
Collaboration Pattern
10 pairs
co-assignee combinations found
Collaboration is narrow and mostly bilateral
Only ten co-assignee pairs appear across the corpus, with the strongest pairings linking a single device maker to one university or one component supplier rather than broad multi-party consortia. This is a field built mostly on solo filings.
The strongest pairs recur at 10-13 shared families, not dozens.
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 drug-eluting stent biocompatible materials, with the prior art for and against each one.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Co-assignee relationships and derived observations. Derived from a Patsnap search on Drug-Eluting Stent Biocompatible Materials 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 holds the ground, and what is still open
Assignee activity in this dataset has gone quiet across the board in the most recent tracked year, which makes the gaps in the claim map more informative than the leaderboard itself right now.
Device Incumbents
0 in latest year
recent-year filings
Established stent makers have paused new filing
Assignees with historical positions in this space, including cardiovascular device specialists, show no new filings in the latest tracked year. Their existing portfolios still cover core coating and hemocompatibility claims filed earlier in the trend.
Watch for renewed filing once the 18-month publication lag clears.
Research Partnerships
13 shared families
strongest co-assignee pair
University-industry pairs anchor specific niches
The strongest co-assignee relationships in the dataset link a single device developer to one academic partner, each contributing to a tight cluster of shared families rather than a broad open network.
Ten co-assignee pairs total across 426 families is a low collaboration density.
Component Suppliers
10 shared families
second-strongest pair
Materials and component suppliers file alongside device firms
A second recurring pairing links a device company to an individual inventor and a components supplier, pointing to supply-chain-level co-filing on specific hardware or coating-application details rather than pure chemistry.
This pattern suggests IP is split between device assembly and coating application steps.
Recent-year filing momentum
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| InspireMD, Inc. | 0 | — |
| Hemoteq AG | 0 | — |
| Abbott Cardiovascular Systems Inc. | 0 | — |
| Japan Medical Device Technology Co., Ltd. | 0 | — |
| Alchimedics | 0 | — |
| Boston Scientific International Limited | 0 | — |
| Q3 Medical Devices Limited | 0 | — |
| Novogen Research Pty Limited | 0 | — |
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee-level momentum. Derived from a Patsnap search on Drug-Eluting Stent Biocompatible Materials 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
The trend and composition data narrow down where diligence effort is best spent next.
Check freedom to operate in polymer chemistry
C08G, C08B and C08L classes carry a fraction of the filings that A61L and A61F do, but that does not mean they are unclaimed. Run a targeted clearance search on the specific polymer chemistry before assuming open space.
Run a clearance searchWatch for a filing rebound
The drop to a 2022 midpoint of 4 filings may partly reflect the 18-month publication lag rather than a genuine pullback. Recheck this trend once 2025 and 2026 filings have had time to publish.
Track filing trendsMap the sterilisation-claim thicket before designing coatings
With 277 of 426 records touching A61L, any new coating or drug-release mechanism should be checked against sterilisation and processing claims early, not just against the underlying polymer art.
Map the claim landscapeSource: Patsnap Eureka. Forward-looking reading of the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Drug-Eluting Stent Biocompatible Materials 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 on this landscape
In this dataset, it means any filing that combines stent or coated-stent claims with material-level claims around biocompatibility, biodegradable polymer coatings, or hemocompatible surfaces. That includes the base polymer chemistry, primer or adhesion layers, sterilisation and surface treatment steps, and drug-release mechanisms built into the coating. It excludes stent designs that make no material-level claim, which is why the search string pairs device language with materials language explicitly.
The data shows filings rising to a peak of 27 in 2018 before falling toward a midpoint of 4 by 2022, a pattern consistent with an early wave of coating and hemocompatibility inventions being claimed and then the obvious claim space narrowing. It is also possible the decline is partly an artefact of the roughly 18-month lag between filing and publication, which understates the most recent years in any trend. Readers should treat the 2022-onward numbers as a floor rather than a confirmed decline until later years finish publishing.
Sterilising and disinfecting claims under A61L appear in 277 of 426 records, and implant and prosthesis claims under A61F appear in 250, making these the two most heavily claimed areas by far. Medicinal preparation claims under A61K follow at 88. Polymer-specific classes such as C09D coatings, C08G condensation polymers, C08B polysaccharides and C08L polymer compositions each sit in the low-to-mid twenties, indicating the base chemistry is claimed far less densely than the device and processing layers around it.
The IPC composition suggests polymer-chemistry sub-areas, including polysaccharide-based matrices, condensation-polymer drug carriers, and hemocompatible surface functionalisation, carry a fraction of the filings seen in sterilisation and implant-structure classes. That gap does not guarantee freedom to operate, since a small number of filings can still cover broad claims, but it does mark where a targeted clearance search is more likely to find room than in the crowded A61L and A61F classes. Recent-year filing has slowed across nearly all assignees, which also widens the practical window for new entrants.
The dataset's recent-year momentum tracking shows every reviewed assignee, including established cardiovascular device makers, at zero new filings in the latest tracked year, so there is currently no single company filing aggressively into this space. Historical activity is concentrated among a mix of device manufacturers, one or two university-industry co-assignee pairs, and component suppliers filing alongside device firms. Because collaboration density is low, with only ten co-assignee pairs found across 426 families, most positions in this field were built through solo filing rather than joint ventures.
Answers are grounded in the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Drug-Eluting Stent Biocompatible Materials 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.