Falling Film Evaporator Patents: Leaders & Filing Trends 2026
- 19.5% concentration at the top. The five most active filers together account for 100 of the 514 records in scope, a leader well ahead of the field at 41 records against 13 for fifth place.
- Filing has cooled since its 2019 peak. Activity peaked at 32 records in 2019 and, over the last complete three-year window, fell 36% from 14 records in 2021 to 9 in 2024.
- Separation and water treatment dominate the IPC mix. B01D separation processes appear on 46.1% of records and C02F water treatment on 18.5%, while heat-exchanger detail classes sit in single digits.
Filing growth compares 2021 (14 records) with 2024 (9) — a three-year span. 2024 is the most recent year we treat as complete: publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so 2025 onwards are still filling in and any growth rate that ends there would understate the field. Top-5 share is the combined record count of the five largest assignees divided by all 514 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this landscape covers
This landscape tracks 514 published records filed between 2015 and mid-2026 that combine falling film evaporator, forced circulation evaporator or multiple-effect evaporation language with operating-parameter terms such as wetting rate, boiling point elevation, scaling on tube, vapor-liquid separation, steam economy and distribution plate. That combination narrows the set to records actually claiming or describing evaporator operation and internals, rather than any document that merely mentions evaporation as a process step.
The scope spans separation and filtration equipment, water and wastewater treatment, pulp processing, fermentation-broth separation and heat-exchanger hardware, so a single record can carry classes from more than one of these areas. Filing counts by year understate the most recent period because publication typically lags filing by around eighteen months, a gap that matters most when reading 2025 and 2026.
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 514 records: how filing activity has moved year on year, and which IPC subclasses carry the claim volume today.
A 2019 peak followed by a cooling three-year window
Annual filings rose from 5 in 2017 to a peak of 32 in 2019. The most recent complete comparison shows a 36% drop, from 14 records in 2021 to 9 in 2024; 2025 and 2026 are still filling in as publications catch up with filing dates, so treat the tail of the chart as provisional rather than a confirmed decline.
Separation and water treatment carry the volume
B01D (separation processes) touches 46.1% of the 514 records and C02F (water and wastewater treatment) touches 18.5%, reflecting how much of this art is framed around liquid separation and effluent handling rather than the heat-exchange hardware itself. F28D and F28F, the heat-exchanger apparatus and detail classes, sit at 11.9% and 6.4% respectively — evidence that tube and plate mechanics are claimed far less densely than the separation step around them.
Shares are the percentage of the 514 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Falling Film and Forced Circulation Evaporators with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about falling film and forced circulation evaporators and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaRepresentative and most-cited filings
Stacked type falling film evaporator, zero liquid discharge system comprising the same, and zero liquid discharging method using the same (US20150190727A1)
A stacked type falling film evaporator includes a first evaporator, a second evaporator, a first vapor recovering device, a second vapor recovering device and a vapor recompressor. The first and second evaporators have evaporation tubes of 5 m to 10 m in length and are stacked so wastewater passes through them in order. Vapor generated in the first evaporator is collected and supplied to the second evaporator, and vapor generated in the second evaporator is likewise recovered, building a cascaded vapor-recompression path across the stack.Filed 2015-07-09 by Doosan Heavy Industries & Construction.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | WO2006023815A2 | Cyclic DIOL-derived blocked mercaptofunctional silane compositions | 541 |
| 2 | US20060041063A1 | Cyclic diol-derived blocked mercaptofunctional silane compositions | 174 |
| 3 | US20110003355A1 | Process of separating components of a fermentation broth | 141 |
| 4 | US20050245753A1 | Cyclic diol-derived blocked mercaptofunctional silane compositions | 108 |
| 5 | WO2010141780A1 | Process of separating components of a fermentation broth | 100 |
| 6 | GB2395946A | Extracting sodium chloride from seawater, using nanofiltration | 96 |
| 7 | US20070197813A1 | Process for making organofunctional silanes and mixtures thereof | 70 |
| 8 | US20090294377A1 | Method for Removing Dissolved Solids from Aqueous Waste Streams | 69 |
| 9 | US5366514A | Salt plant evaporation | 54 |
| 10 | US4054493A | Method and apparatus for converting saline water to fresh water | 51 |
Citation counts favour older filings that have had more time to accumulate references inside this corpus; read them as a signal of influence, not of current commercial relevance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Read together, the concentration figures, the technology mix and the filing trend point to a field where separation-side claims are dense and heat-exchanger hardware claims are comparatively open.
A clear leader, then a long tail
The leading assignee holds 41 records, well ahead of 13 at fifth place, and the top ten combined reach just 30.4% of all 514 records. That leaves the majority of filings spread across a long tail of single- or few-filing entrants, which is unusual concentration for a hardware-adjacent field this mature.
Activity has cooled from its 2019 peak
Filings peaked at 32 in 2019 and dropped 36% from 14 in 2021 to 9 in 2024. Because publication lags filing by roughly eighteen months, the 2025-2026 figures are not yet reliable evidence of a continuing slide.
Separation claims dominate over hardware detail
B01D separation-process claims sit on nearly half the dataset, while F28F heat-exchanger detail claims sit on barely one in fifteen records. That gap suggests tube layout, plate geometry and scaling-mitigation hardware are comparatively under-claimed relative to the separation and phase-handling steps around them.
US, EPO and PCT lead the filing routes
The United States receives the most filings at 101, ahead of the EPO at 69, WIPO/PCT at 54, China at 52, India at 37 and Canada at 29. That spread indicates applicants are pursuing multi-jurisdiction protection rather than concentrating on a single home market.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to falling film and forced circulation evaporators, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who is filing, and where the gate is thin
One assignee has built a meaningfully larger position than the rest of the ranked field, but the concentration figures show most of the 514 records belong to companies filing only occasionally in this space.
A single filer well ahead of the pack
The leading assignee's 41 records compare with 13 at fifth place and 10 at tenth, a steep drop-off that marks this as a field with one dominant filer rather than a tight cluster of comparable competitors.
The next tier is thinly spread
Beyond the leader, filing counts fall off quickly: the ten most active assignees together hold less than a third of all records, meaning most of the ranked field files rarely rather than repeatedly.
Co-filing is limited and internal
The strongest co-assignee pairs recur within a single organisation's own inventor teams rather than across company lines, suggesting little formal cross-company collaboration is visible in the public record for this technology.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Genomatica Inc. | 0 | — |
| Momentive Performance Materials Inc. | 0 | — |
| Carrier Corp. | 0 | — |
| Ahlstrom Oyj | 0 | — |
| Purac Biochem BV | 0 | — |
| EXCELENTEC HLDG | 0 | — |
| International N&H Denmark ApS | 0 | — |
| PPG IND CANADA LTD | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to a field with dense separation-side claims and comparatively open heat-exchanger hardware claims. The next step is testing a specific concept against that landscape.
Map a specific design against the leader's portfolio
Run a freedom-to-operate check on tube geometry, distribution plate or vapor recompression concepts against the 41-record leader and the next tier of filers before committing engineering resources.
Explore in Patsnap EurekaTrack the 2025-2026 filing tail as it fills in
Because publication lags filing by roughly eighteen months, revisit the trend once 2025 and 2026 records finish populating to confirm whether the 2021-2024 slowdown continued or reversed.
Explore in Patsnap EurekaTest claim language in the under-claimed branches
Distribution plate design, anti-scaling tube geometry and steam economy optimisation show thinner filing density than the core separation classes, making them worth a targeted novelty search.
Explore in Patsnap EurekaCommon questions about this landscape
The ranked field covers 100 companies, with one assignee holding 41 records, well ahead of 13 at fifth place and 10 at tenth. The top five filers combined account for 19.5% of the 514 records in scope, and the top ten reach 30.4%, so while there is a clear leader, most of the ranked field files only occasionally. This pattern suggests a market where one or two organisations have built durable positions while the rest compete on narrower, more specific claims.
Filing peaked at 32 records in 2019 and has since cooled, falling 36% from 14 records in 2021 to 9 in 2024, the last year that can be treated as a complete comparison. Figures for 2025 and 2026 are still incomplete because publication typically lags filing by around eighteen months, so it is too early to call this a continuing decline rather than a temporary trough. Anyone tracking this trend should revisit it once the most recent two years have had time to fully publish.
Separation processes under IPC class B01D appear on 46.1% of the 514 records, making it by far the most heavily claimed area, followed by water and wastewater treatment (C02F) at 18.5%. Heat-exchanger apparatus and detail classes, F28D and F28F, sit much lower at 11.9% and 6.4% respectively. Because a single record can carry multiple IPC classes, these figures overlap rather than summing to 100%, but the gap between separation-side and hardware-side claim density is consistent and notable.
The technology composition data shows heat-exchanger hardware details, such as tube-side anti-scaling geometry and distribution plate design for uniform wetting, are claimed far less densely than the separation and water-treatment steps around them. Vapor recompression cascade control and multi-effect steam economy optimisation also show comparatively thin coverage relative to the core separation classes. These are reasonable starting points for a novelty search before committing to a specific hardware design.
The United States leads with 101 filings, ahead of the European Patent Office at 69 and the WIPO/PCT route at 54. China follows at 52, India at 37 and Canada at 29. The spread across these six receiving offices indicates that applicants in this field are generally pursuing protection across several major markets rather than filing in a single home jurisdiction alone.
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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.