FIB Circuit Edit & Sample Prep Patents: Top Filers & Trends 2026
Focused Ion Beam Circuit Edit and Sample Prep Patents
30.2% of all 1,479 records sit with the five leading assignees, with a long tail of single- and few-filing entrants behind them. Filings ran from 57 in 2017 to a peak of 118 in 2025, with the reliable comparison being 2021's 44 against 2024's 58 — a 32% rise over that span. Counts for 2025 and 2026 look lower only because publication trails filing by roughly 18 months; they are not evidence of a slowdown.
- 1FEI CO16.7%
- 2SILVEBROOK KIA6.8%
- 3ABBOTT LAB INC2.5%
- 4FEI EFA INC2.2%
- 5TECHINSIGHTS INC2.1%
See the full focused ion beam circuit edit and sample prep 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 holds the most patents in focused ion beam circuit edit and sample prep?
One instrument maker leads the ranked list with 247 records, well ahead of the fifth-place assignee at 31 and tenth place at 23. That gap indicates a single company built much of the original commercial FIB circuit-edit platform and has kept filing around it since. The ranking runs to 100 companies total, though, so leadership at the top does not mean the field is closed — most of those 100 hold only a handful of records each.
Is the focused ion beam patent field still growing?
Filings rose from 44 in 2021 to 58 in 2024, a 32% increase over that span, and 2025 posted the highest raw count on record at 118. The apparent drop in 2025 and 2026 figures is a publication-lag artifact — patent applications typically publish around 18 months after filing, so the most recent one to two years always look artificially low. Judged on the last fully-settled years, the trend is upward, not flat or declining.
What patent classes cover focused ion beam sample preparation techniques?
The two largest IPC subclasses are H01L (semiconductor devices), covering 29.4% of the 1,479 records, and H01J (electron and discharge tubes), covering 27.9%. G01N material analysis and testing covers about a fifth of records, reflecting the inspection side of the workflow. Coating (C23C), photolithography (G03F), electroplating (C25D) and printed-circuit classes (H05K) each cover under 12%, marking thinner, more specific claim territory around deposition and plating steps.
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 Focused Ion Beam Circuit Edit and Sample Prep 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.