Focused Ion Beam Prep Patents: Top Companies & Trends 2026
- 59.2% of all 360 records sit with the top five assignees combined, so most of the working claim space in FIB sample prep is already staked out by a small group.
- Filing held steady, not surged, with 2021-to-2024 growth at +5% after a 2022 peak of 30 filings — this is a mature, not a rising, field.
- H01J and G01N dominate at 51.4% and 25.0% of records respectively, while image processing (G06T) sits at just 6.7% — a comparatively thin layer given how central automation has become to lamella throughput.
Filing growth compares 2021 (22 records) with 2024 (23) — 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 360 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What focused ion beam sample preparation patents actually cover
Focused ion beam (FIB) sample preparation spans the hardware and process claims around milling, lifting out and thinning specimens for electron microscopy — gallium implantation control, milling angle geometry, curtaining artifact mitigation, and cryo transfer of frozen biological or battery samples. The 360 records in scope run from 2015 through the partial 2026 year, with the technology’s centre of gravity in electron-optical column and stage hardware rather than downstream software.
Because publication trails filing by roughly 18 months, the most recent one to two years in any trend understate real activity — a filing made in 2025 may not surface in the public record until well into 2026 or later.
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 360-record corpus: how filings have moved year over year, and how the technology splits across IPC subclasses.
A steady field, not a growth story
Filings rose from 3 in 2017 to a peak of 30 in 2022, then settled to a modest +5% climb from 22 in 2021 to 23 in 2024 — the last year that can be read as complete. Treat 2025 and 2026 figures as still filling in rather than as a slowdown.
Hardware claims outweigh software claims
H01J (electron and discharge tubes) touches 51.4% of the 360 records and G01N (material analysis and testing) another 25.0%, confirming that most claim activity sits in the instrument and process layer. G06T (image data processing) covers only 6.7% of records — thin, given how much automation now matters to preparation throughput.
Shares are the percentage of the 360 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Focused Ion Beam Sample Preparation with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about focused ion beam sample preparation and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe records other filings build on
Real-time fluorescence monitoring for cryo-FIB milling
Filed by the Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, this 2024 application describes a cryo-FIB device combining a vacuum chamber, ion beam system and a fluorescence imaging system arranged beneath a cryo stage. The fluorescence system performs real-time optical imaging on a frozen sample carrying a fluorescent marker during processing, giving the operator a live readout of target location as milling proceeds.Filed 2024-08-29 · Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US8171618B1 | Tunable pole trim processes for fabricating trapezoidal perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR) write poles | 148 |
| 2 | US6570170B2 | Total release method for sample extraction from a charged-particle instrument | 134 |
| 3 | US20040151991A1 | Photolithography mask repair | 89 |
| 4 | US5901432A | Method for making a thin film inductive write head having a pedestal pole tip and an electroplated gap | 69 |
| 5 | US5472566A | Specimen holder and apparatus for two-sided ion milling system | 66 |
| 6 | US20130216779A1 | Nanostructures from Laser-Ablated Nanohole Templates | 64 |
| 7 | US7442924B2 | Repetitive circumferential milling for sample preparation | 63 |
| 8 | WO2021180600A1 | Method of cross-section imaging of an inspection volumes in wafer | 56 |
| 9 | US20020121614A1 | Total release method for sample extraction from a charged-particle instrument | 56 |
| 10 | US20120112062A1 | Environmental Cell for Charged Particle Beam System | 48 |
Citation counts favour older filings inside a searched corpus — read them as a signal of influence on later work, not as a measure of current importance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
Put your own technology through the same analysis
Eureka on the web
When you want the answer in the next five minutes.
The agent works the prompt against patents and technical literature, citing every source.
Run your analysis now →MCP server & REST API
When it has to run inside your own pipeline.
Patent search, landscape analysis and assignee resolution as MCP tools. Drop them into any agent framework, or call REST directly.
Browse MCP servers →What the data means for filing strategy
Three read-outs from the corpus that matter more for a filing decision than the raw counts alone.
The top of the field is crowded
The five leading assignees between them hold 213 of the 360 records in scope. A new filer entering core milling-angle or gallium-implantation claim territory is filing directly against instrument makers who have been building continuation families there for years.
Growth is real but modest
The 2021-to-2024 span shows filing volume moving from 22 to 23, a +5% change after the field's 2022 peak of 30. That is consistent with an established technology being refined at the margins, not one being reinvented.
Automation claims are thin relative to hardware
G06T (image data processing and generation) covers just 24 of the 360 records against H01J's 185. Given how much preparation throughput now depends on automated scripting and image-guided milling decisions, the software layer looks comparatively under-claimed.
Filing is US- and EPO-centred
The United States receives 163 of the tracked filings, with the EPO at 80 and WIPO/PCT routes at 47. Germany, Austria and the UK each sit in the low teens, marking Europe as a secondary but active filing region for this technology.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to focused ion beam sample preparation, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who holds the claim space
The assignee ranking covers 79 companies across the 360 records in scope — not a top-50 or top-100 cut, but the full set the data endpoint returns.
One filer sits well ahead of the field
The leading assignee's 120 records dwarf the fifth-place count of 13, showing a single dominant instrument maker rather than a tight cluster of comparable-sized filers at the very top.
A long tail of smaller filers
By tenth place the count has fallen to 5 records, and the ranking runs to 79 companies total — most of them holding only a handful of families each. That tail includes university and instrument-service filers alongside the large manufacturers.
Recent-year activity has cooled among top filers
Several of the most active historical assignees show zero filings in the latest tracked year, and the one still filing is down 80% year over year. Given the 18-month publication lag, this reads as a data-visibility gap for 2025–2026 rather than confirmed withdrawal from the field.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Carl Zeiss SMT GmbH | 1 | -80% |
| FEI Company | 0 | — |
| International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) | 0 | — |
| Hennyz BV | 0 | — |
| E A FISCHIONE INSTR | 0 | — |
| The Provost, Fellows, Foundation Scholars and the other Members of Board of the College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity of Queen Elizabeth near Dublin | 0 | — |
| Magnetic Peripherals Inc. | 0 | — |
| Ultra Small Fibers LLC | 0 | — |
Where to take this next
The landscape points to specific questions worth running against the live dataset rather than against this snapshot.
Track the 2025–2026 filing gap
Several leading assignees show no filings in the latest tracked year. Re-running the trend in a few quarters, once publication catches up, will show whether that is a real pullback or just the reporting lag.
Explore filing trends in EurekaMap the automation sub-claims in detail
G06T's 6.7% share is thin next to H01J's 51.4%. A finer breakdown of which specific automation and image-processing claims exist would clarify how open that space really is.
Search IPC subclasses in EurekaWatch the top assignee's continuation pattern
With 120 of 360 records, the leading filer's family structure is worth tracing directly to see how claims have narrowed or broadened over successive continuations.
Trace assignee families in EurekaCommon questions on FIB sample preparation patents
One assignee leads the ranked field with 120 of the 360 records in scope, well ahead of the fifth-place holder at 13. The top five assignees combined account for 59.2% of all 360 records, meaning a majority of the documented claim space sits with a small group of instrument makers. Beyond that, the ranking runs to 79 companies, with a long tail holding only a handful of families each — so there is room to file, but not in the areas the leaders have already covered densely.
Growth has been modest rather than steep. Filings rose from 3 in 2017 to a peak of 30 in 2022, then the 2021-to-2024 span — the most recent period reliable enough to read as complete — shows just a +5% increase, from 22 to 23. Because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, 2025 and 2026 figures are still incomplete and should not be read as a decline; they simply haven't caught up yet.
H01J, covering electron and discharge tubes, appears in 51.4% of the 360 records, making it the single largest IPC subclass in the corpus. G01N (material analysis and testing) follows at 25.0% and H01L (semiconductor devices) at 23.9%. Because a single record can carry multiple IPC classes, these shares add up to more than 100% — they describe overlapping claim territory, not a strict partition of the field.
The clearest gap is in automation and image-processing claims: G06T, covering image data processing and generation, appears in only 6.7% of the 360 records despite automated scripting and image-guided endpoint detection being central to modern lamella preparation throughput. Cryo transfer staging and curtaining-artifact correction also show comparatively lighter claim density than the core milling-hardware classes. These are areas where a well-drafted first claim could still find open ground.
The United States is the leading receiving office with 163 filings, followed by the European Patent Office at 80 and the WIPO/PCT route at 47. Germany, Austria and the United Kingdom each sit in the low teens. This pattern points to the US and Europe as the primary markets where applicants are seeking protection for this technology, with PCT filings used as a common entry route into multiple jurisdictions at once.
Research Focused Ion Beam Sample Preparation in depth with Eureka
Go past this page: query the whole focused ion beam sample preparation corpus yourself, in your own scope.
Every answer comes back with patent numbers you can open.
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.