Extrahepatic Nanoparticle Delivery Patents: Leaders & Gaps 2026
Extrahepatic and targeted nanoparticle delivery patents: who holds the ligand and biodistribution claims
36.8% sits with five filers. Top 5 assignees combined hold 316 of 858 records in scope — concentrated, but not a single-owner field. Filings peaked at 68 in 2017 and had fallen to 33 by 2024, a 43% decline across the 2021-2024 window. Publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so the 2025 and 2026 figures shown here are still filling in and should not be read as the field going quiet.
- 1PFIZER INC114
- 2MASSACHUSETTS INST OF TECH86
- 3THE BROAD INST INC56
- 4STC UNM34
- 5ELUCIDA ONCOLOGY INC26
See the full extrahepatic and targeted nanoparticle delivery 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 on this landscape
Who are the leading patent holders in extrahepatic and targeted nanoparticle delivery?
The dataset’s ranked leader holds 114 of the 858 records in scope, well ahead of the fifth-place assignee at 26 and tenth place at 22. The top five combined account for 36.8% of all records and the top ten for 50.8%, so while the field has a clear leader, more than half of the activity is spread across a long tail of ranked and unranked filers. The mix includes large pharmaceutical companies, research universities and specialist delivery-technology firms, several of which co-file together.
Is patent filing in this field growing or slowing down?
Filings peaked in 2017 at 68 and had fallen to 33 by 2024, a 43% decline across the 2021-2024 window. That decline should be read carefully: publication typically lags filing by about 18 months, so the 2025 and 2026 counts in any trend chart are still incomplete and will rise as more filings publish. The safest read is that activity cooled from its 2017 high through 2024; anything claimed about 2025-2026 from raw counts alone is premature.
What technology areas dominate the patent claims in this space?
A61K, the medicinal-preparations subclass, appears on 67.5% of the 858 records, making formulation-level claims the dominant style in this field. A61P (therapeutic activity) and C12N (microorganisms and genetic engineering) follow at 24.8% and 20.2% respectively. B82Y, the subclass specific to nanotechnology applications, covers only 11.5% of records, indicating that most protection is written around what the composition does rather than how the particle itself is engineered.
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 Extrahepatic and Targeted Nanoparticle Delivery 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.