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Run your analysis now →https://www.patsnap.com/resources/blog/rd-blog/fault-location-in-distribution-networks-patent-landscape/ · Patsnap · data cut-off 2026-07-31 · downloaded from the live page
Patent Landscape · Distribution AutomationFault Location in Distribution Networks: Patents, Leaders and Filing Trends
- Concentrated at the top. The top 5 assignees hold 72.4% of all 87 records in scope, and the top 10 hold 92.0% — a small group of utilities and grid vendors controls most of the claim space.
- Filings accelerated sharply. From 2021 to 2024, filings rose from 1 to 6 records, a +500% increase over three years, with 2022 the peak year so far at 19 records.
- Two IPC classes dominate. G01R (electric & magnetic measurement) and H02H (protective circuit arrangements) each appear in 66.7% of the 87 records, showing claims cluster tightly around measurement and protection logic rather than the wider grid stack.
87
Published Records
72%
Top-5 Share of All Records
+500%
Filing Growth 2021→2024
US
Leading Jurisdiction
Filing growth compares 2021 (1 records) with 2024 (6) — 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 87 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
Published byPatsnap Research··7 min readSourced from Patsnap Eureka
Overview
What this landscape covers
Fault location in distribution networks covers the methods used to detect and pinpoint faults on medium- and low-voltage feeders, with particular emphasis on high impedance fault detection, earth fault detection and the signal-processing and sensor techniques that support them. The scope spans impedance-based localisation, waveform-signature analysis, arc suppression coil control and the sensitivity/false-trip trade-offs that determine whether a detection method is deployable on a live network. This is a narrow, applied slice of protection engineering rather than the whole smart-grid field.
The dataset in scope holds 87 published records dated between 2015 and the 2026-07-31 cut-off. Publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so the most recent one to two years understate actual filing activity and should be read as provisional rather than declining.
Filing activity and technology mix, 2015-2026
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee ranking and totals. Derived from a Patsnap search on Fault Location in Distribution Networks 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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The data
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 87 records: how filing activity moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses carry the claims.
Filing trend, 2017-2026
Filings climbed from 6 in 2017 to a peak of 19 in 2022, then eased in the years that follow — though 2025 and 2026 figures are still filling in due to publication lag and should not be read as a slowdown. The 2021-to-2024 span alone shows a +500% rise, from 1 to 6 records.
IPC subclass composition
G01R and H02H each cover 66.7% of the 87 records, confirming that most claims sit in measurement and protective-circuit territory. H02J (power supply & grid systems) and H01H (switches & relays) form a distant second tier at 9.2% and 5.7%, with G01N, G06F, H02M and G05B each below 3% — thin coverage that points to under-claimed adjacent ground.
Shares are the percentage of the 87 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 Fault Location in Distribution Networks covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.
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Representative filing and most-cited prior art
Representative recent filing
Method and system for identifying high impedance fault and switching disturbance based on Lissajous curve (AU2024203454B2)
SHANDONG UNIVERSITY
Filed by Shandong University, this record constructs a zero-sequence Lissajous curve from zero-sequence voltage and current, then applies mathematical morphology — dilation, erosion, opening and closing operations — to extract mutation features and distinguish a genuine high impedance fault from a switching disturbance using the largest difference between opening and closing results across half-cycles.Published 2025-12-18 — illustrates how recent filings combine waveform-signature analysis with morphological signal processing rather than pure impedance calculation.
View full recordMost-cited records in this dataset
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US20080077336A1 | Power line universal monitor | 764 |
| 2 | US20200393505A1 | Effective feature set-based high impedance fault detection | 29 |
| 3 | US20210075210A1 | Method and apparatus for use in earth-fault protection | 28 |
| 4 | CN103454555A | 基于参数识别的配电网单相接地故障区段定位方法 | 28 |
| 5 | CN107179466A | 小电流接地系统的单相接地故障选线方法 | 22 |
| 6 | WO2014090816A1 | Ground fault direction determination for medium or high voltage distribution networks | 22 |
| 7 | EP3506445A1 | System for identification of a feeder with high-ohmic earth fault in a distribution network | 17 |
| 8 | WO2004040732A1 | Earth fault protection for synchronous machines | 15 |
| 9 | US20210075209A1 | Method and apparatus for use in earth-fault protection | 14 |
| 10 | WO2012056287A2 | A protection relay for sensitive earth fault prtection | 14 |
Citation counts favour older records simply because they have had longer to accumulate them — treat this table as a map of influential prior art, not of current filing strength.
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.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Citation counts and representative records. Derived from a Patsnap search on Fault Location in Distribution Networks 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
Three patterns stand out once concentration, timing and classification are read together.
Concentration
72.4% / 92.0%
top 5 / top 10 share of 87 records
A short list controls most of the space
The top 5 assignees combine for 72.4% of all 87 records in scope, and the top 10 reach 92.0%. With 31 companies ranked in total, the remaining names each hold only a handful of filings — a long tail rather than a second tier of comparable competitors.
Freedom-to-operate work should start with the leaders, not the tail.
Momentum
+500%
filings, 2021 to 2024
Activity built quickly, then the record thins out from lag
Filings rose from 1 in 2021 to 6 in 2024, and the field's peak year so far, 2022, saw 19 records. The apparent dip after 2024 is consistent with the roughly 18-month gap between filing and publication, not with declining interest.
Treat 2025-2026 counts as incomplete, not as a trend reversal.
Classification
66.7% / 66.7%
share of 87 records in G01R and H02H
Claims sit on measurement and protection logic
G01R and H02H each cover two-thirds of the 87 records, while H02J, H01H, G01N, G06F, H02M and G05B together account for a much smaller slice. Recent filings, including the Shandong University Lissajous-curve method, layer signal-processing techniques onto this core rather than moving into new IPC ground.
Adjacent classes below 3% share are worth a closer prior-art check before filing there.
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 fault location in distribution networks, with the prior art for and against each one.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Co-assignee relationships and derived observations. Derived from a Patsnap search on Fault Location in Distribution Networks 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 claim space
The leader holds 37 records against a fifth-place figure of 5 and a tenth-place figure of 3 — a steep drop-off that marks this as a leader-plus-long-tail field rather than a crowded multi-way contest.
Leader
37 records
leading assignee
One filer sets the pace by a wide margin
The top-ranked assignee holds 37 of the 87 records in scope, well ahead of the fifth-place holder at 5 and tenth-place at 3. That gap means most of the established impedance-based and protective-circuit methods are already claimed by a single organisation's portfolio.
Check this filer's claims first for any new impedance-based method.
Co-filing
10 pairs
co-assignee pairs identified
Collaboration is limited and vendor-centred
Only 10 co-assignee pairs appear across the dataset, with the strongest links all involving the same corporate filer paired with different named inventors. This points to in-house R&D teams rather than cross-company joint filing as the norm in this field.
Few external partnership signals to track here.
Geography
US 17 / EPO 16 / CN 11
leading receiving offices
Filing is spread across three major offices
The United States (17), the European Patent Office (16) and China (11) are the busiest receiving offices, with Australia and WIPO/PCT each at 10 and Germany at 7. No single jurisdiction dominates filing strategy the way the top assignee dominates ownership.
A freedom-to-operate check needs all three major offices, not one.
Recent-year filing momentum
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| ABB (Schweiz) AG | 0 | — |
| Winter Brothers AB | 0 | — |
| ABB TECHNOLOGY LTD | 0 | — |
| Alstom Technology Ltd | 0 | — |
| S&C Electric Co. | 0 | — |
| SafeGrid Oy | 0 | -100% |
| Xi'an Jiaotong University | 0 | — |
| State Grid Corporation of China | 0 | — |
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee-level momentum. Derived from a Patsnap search on Fault Location in Distribution Networks 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 analysis
The dataset points to specific next steps depending on whether the goal is freedom-to-operate, whitespace filing, or tracking a competitor.
Run a freedom-to-operate check against the leader
With one assignee holding 37 of 87 records, any new impedance-based or protective-circuit method should be checked against that portfolio before drafting claims.
Explore assignee portfolios in EurekaTest claim language in the under-3%-share classes
G01N, G06F, H02M and G05B each carry a small share of the 87 records — a targeted search will show whether that reflects genuine white space or simply narrower applicability.
Search IPC white space in EurekaSource: Patsnap Eureka. Forward-looking reading of the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Fault Location in Distribution Networks 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 about this landscape
Filing is concentrated: the top 5 assignees combine for 72.4% of the 87 records in scope, and the top 10 reach 92.0%. The single leading assignee holds 37 records, far ahead of the fifth-place holder at 5 and the tenth-place holder at 3. This means a small group of grid operators and equipment vendors controls most of the claimed methods, with a long tail of 31 ranked companies holding only a few filings each.
Filings grew sharply between 2021 and 2024, rising from 1 to 6 records, a +500% increase over that span, with 2022 the strongest year so far at 19 records. Counts for 2025 and 2026 appear lower, but that reflects the roughly 18-month lag between filing and publication rather than a genuine slowdown. Any read on recent-year momentum should treat the last one to two years as incomplete.
Two IPC subclasses dominate: G01R (electric and magnetic measurement) and H02H (protective circuit arrangements), each appearing in 66.7% of the 87 records. Because a single record can carry several IPC classes, these shares overlap rather than summing to 100%. Secondary classes such as H02J (power supply and grid systems) and H01H (switches and relays) appear far less often, at 9.2% and 5.7% respectively, and classes like G01N, G06F, H02M and G05B each cover under 3% of records — signalling much thinner coverage there.
The classes with the lowest record shares — G01N (material analysis), G06F (digital data processing), H02M (power conversion) and G05B (control and regulating systems), each under 3% of the 87 records — represent the thinnest claimed ground relative to the dominant G01R/H02H measurement-and-protection cluster. That does not guarantee an easy grant, but it does mean fewer competing claims to search around. A targeted prior-art search in these classes is a reasonable first step before drafting.
There are 31 companies in the full assignee ranking, but ownership is far from evenly spread: the top 5 alone account for 72.4% of all 87 records, and the top 10 account for 92.0%. That leaves the remaining roughly 21 ranked companies sharing the final 8% of records between them. Practically, this is a leader-plus-long-tail field rather than a fragmented, competitive one.
Answers are grounded in the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Fault Location in Distribution Networks 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.