Electromagnetic Wave Absorbing Materials Patents: Who Leads 2026
- Filing has plateaued, not grown. the trend rises from 1 filing in 2017 to a peak of 17 in 2023, but 2022 already sat at 14 — momentum is flat to declining, not accelerating.
- Ownership is thin at the top. the leader holds only 10 records and the top 5 combined account for 23.9% of all 113 records in scope — no single assignee dominates this field.
- Two IPC classes carry the field. H05K (printed circuits & assemblies) and H01Q (antennas) appear in 72.6% and 55.8% of records respectively, while structural and nanotech classes stay under 12%.
What the patent record shows
Electromagnetic wave absorbing materials sit at the intersection of materials science and electronics packaging: claims here cover magnetic loss fillers, layered absorber structures and the impedance-matching designs that let a material shed incident microwave energy across a target bandwidth rather than reflect it. The scope tracked here — 113 published records between 2015 and mid-2026 — is filtered to filings that explicitly address absorption bandwidth, thickness constraints, magnetic loss fillers, impedance matching or environmental durability, which narrows the field to applied absorber engineering rather than general electromagnetic theory.
China accounts for the largest share of receiving-office activity, with India, the United States, Europe, Australia and the United Kingdom trailing well behind. That distribution, combined with a filing curve that peaked in 2023 and has not been exceeded since, points to a field where the applied engineering problem is well understood but not yet consolidated under a small number of dominant filers.
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 113 records: how filing activity has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses the claims actually sit in.
A peak in 2023, not a straight line up
Filings rose from 1 in 2017 to a peak of 17 in 2023. The midpoint year, 2022, already reached 14 — meaning the growth curve flattened before the most recent data, and the partial 2026 count of 6 should be read as an undercount given typical 18-month publication lag rather than as a genuine slowdown signal on its own.
Circuits and antennas dominate the claim space
H05K (printed circuits & assemblies) and H01Q (antennas) appear in 72.6% and 55.8% of the 113 records respectively — because a record can carry multiple IPC codes, these two classes overlap heavily, reflecting absorber materials claimed alongside the circuit or antenna assembly they protect. Materials-focused classes such as C01B, C09K and B32B each sit under 18%, and nanotechnology (B82Y) and powder metallurgy (B22F) remain under 9% — an indication that most claims are anchored to an end application rather than to the raw material chemistry alone.
Shares are the percentage of the 113 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Electromagnetic Wave Absorbing Materials with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about electromagnetic wave absorbing materials and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaRepresentative filing and most-cited prior art
WO2004091049A1 — Microwave absorber with improved microwave absorption rate
Filed by Chang Sung Corporation, this record targets microwave leakage and radiation noise in mobile communication terminals. It discloses a conductive thin-film absorber combining a magnetic composite and dielectric material microwave-absorbing layer with a resistive film formed on its surface, where the resistive film induces impedance matching and the magnetic-dielectric combination allows the absorber to be made thinner.Numbers, assignee and filing date for this record are rendered separately from the dataset.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US5085931A | Microwave absorber employing acicular magnetic metallic filaments | 42 |
| 2 | US9961812B2 | Method and apparatus for creating perfect microwave absorbing skins | 40 |
| 3 | US5275880A | Microwave absorber for direct surface application | 39 |
| 4 | EP0398672A1 | Microwave absorber for direct surface application | 34 |
| 5 | US4496950A | Enhanced wide angle performance microwave absorber | 33 |
| 6 | US5661484A | Multi-fiber species artificial dielectric radar absorbing material and method for producing same | 30 |
| 7 | CN105514619A | 一种加载片式电阻的超宽频带超材料微波吸收器 | 23 |
| 8 | EP0380267A1 | Microwave absorber employing acicular magnetic metallic filaments | 22 |
| 9 | CN107809006A | 基于透明导电薄膜的透明超宽带微波吸波器 | 16 |
| 10 | US4480256A | Microwave absorber | 15 |
Citation counts favour older filings simply because they have had longer to accumulate citations within the searched corpus; treat them as a marker of influence on the field rather than of current commercial relevance.
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 numbers mean for a filing decision
Three patterns stand out once the ranking, the trend and the IPC composition are read together.
No single filer controls this space
The leading assignee holds 10 records out of 113, and the top 5 combined reach only 23.9% of all records in scope. Tenth place holds just 2. That is a fragmented field: freedom-to-operate risk is spread across dozens of smaller filers rather than concentrated in one blocking portfolio.
Growth has already flattened
Filing rose from a single record in 2017 to 17 in 2023, but 2022 was already at 14 — the curve levelled off a year before its peak rather than continuing to climb. None of the named leading assignees show positive year-on-year momentum in the latest year tracked.
Claims cluster around the application, not the raw material
H05K and H01Q together dominate the IPC composition, meaning most claims are written around the circuit assembly or antenna the absorber protects. Materials-only classes such as C01G, B82Y and B22F stay in single digits to low teens, suggesting the underlying filler chemistry is comparatively less crowded than the applied engineering around it.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to electromagnetic wave absorbing materials, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who is filing, and where the gate sits
The ranked list spans 87 companies across universities, electronics manufacturers and materials specialists, with no single entity holding a commanding position.
A modest lead, not a monopoly
The top-ranked assignee holds 10 of the 113 records in scope, a lead that is real but far from dominant in a field this fragmented. Fifth place already drops to 3 records, and tenth place to 2 — the ranking flattens quickly outside the first few positions.
Receiving offices skew heavily to China
China accounts for the largest share of receiving-office activity at 68 filings, with India (13) and the United States (9) the next largest. Europe, Australia and the United Kingdom each register in single digits, pointing to a field where R&D activity and IP filing are currently concentrated in Asian jurisdictions.
Collaboration is limited and localized
Only 10 co-assignee pairings appear across the dataset, and the strongest of these links a single Korean absorber manufacturer to its named inventor across three shared filings. Cross-institutional or cross-border co-filing is rare, which is consistent with a field still populated mostly by single-assignee filings out of universities and materials companies.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| 3M Company | 0 | — |
| Flextronics | 0 | — |
| Shandong University | 0 | — |
| Northwestern Polytechnical University | 0 | -100% |
| University of Electronic Science and Technology of China | 0 | — |
| Chang Sung Corporation | 0 | — |
| KIM SUNG SOO | 0 | — |
| Chang Sung (Ju Chang-seong) | 0 | — |
Where to take this next
The dataset points to a fragmented, application-anchored field with a flattening filing curve — three directions worth following up.
Check freedom-to-operate against fragmented ownership
With the top 5 assignees holding only 23.9% of 113 records, a single-portfolio clearance search will miss most of the relevant prior art. A full landscape sweep of the ranked list is the more reliable starting point.
Run a clearance search in EurekaWatch the materials-only classes for emerging claims
C01G, B82Y and B22F sit well under the H05K and H01Q shares, suggesting filler-chemistry claims are less crowded than application claims. That gap is worth monitoring as filing activity shifts.
Track IPC-level movement in EurekaRe-check the 2025–2026 filings once publication catches up
The partial 2026 count understates real filing activity because of the roughly 18-month publication lag; a re-pull in a year will give a truer read on whether the 2023 peak was the field's high point.
Set a monitoring alert in EurekaCommon questions about this landscape
The ranked list covers 87 companies, and the leading assignee holds 10 of the 113 records in scope, with the top 5 combined reaching 23.9% of all records. That means ownership is spread thin rather than concentrated in a handful of dominant portfolios. Universities and electronics manufacturers both appear near the top of the ranking, reflecting the field's mix of applied materials research and commercial packaging work. A freedom-to-operate check in this space needs to look well beyond the first few names on the list.
Filing rose from a single record in 2017 to a peak of 17 in 2023, but the midpoint year of 2022 already reached 14 records — so growth had largely flattened before the peak rather than continuing to accelerate. The partial 2026 figure of 6 records is not a sign of decline on its own, since publication typically lags actual filing by around 18 months. Taken together, the trend looks like a maturing, steady-state field rather than one still in a growth phase.
H05K, covering printed circuits and assemblies, appears in 72.6% of the 113 records, and H01Q, covering antennas, appears in 55.8% — together these show that most claims are tied to a specific circuit or antenna application rather than filed as standalone material compositions. Materials-focused classes such as C01B, C09K and B32B each sit under 18%, and nanotechnology-specific filings under B82Y stay near 8%. Because records often carry more than one IPC code, these shares add up to more than 100% and should be read as overlap, not as a breakdown of the full total.
WO2004091049A1, filed by Chang Sung Corporation, discloses a conductive thin-film microwave absorber that combines a magnetic composite and dielectric microwave-absorbing layer with a surface resistive film that induces impedance matching, aimed at reducing microwave leakage in mobile communication terminals. Its specific value is combining thickness reduction with impedance matching in a single resistive-film construction. Anyone filing a similar thin-film, resistive-layer impedance-matching design in the mobile-terminal absorber space should review its claims closely, though the surrounding field of 113 records shows plenty of alternative material and structural routes that do not rely on the same resistive-film mechanism.
The technology composition points to under-claimed territory in materials-only classes: B82Y (nanostructured fillers), B22F (powder metallurgy composites) and C01G (multi-metal oxide compounds) all sit in single digits to low teens as a share of the 113 records, well below the 72.6% and 55.8% shares held by the application-anchored H05K and H01Q classes. That gap suggests filler chemistry and layered laminate structures (B32B, 10.6%) are comparatively open relative to circuit- and antenna-integrated absorber claims. A first claim in these branches would do better to anchor on the material composition and processing route rather than the end-device integration, since that is where the existing claim density is lowest.
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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.