Gas Lift Design Patents: Top Companies & Filing Trends 2026
- 33.4% concentration. The top 5 assignees account for 123 of 368 records in scope — a genuinely concentrated field, not a fragmented one.
- Growth has cooled, not stopped. Filings ran 2021's 10 down to 2024's 9, a -10% span, after peaking at 23 in 2022.
- One class dominates the classification map. E21B covers 95.1% of the 368 records, with valve, pump and sensing classes forming a thinner secondary layer.
Filing growth compares 2021 (10 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 368 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this landscape covers
Gas lift design and operation sits at the intersection of well completion hardware and production optimisation: gas lift valves, mandrels, and the operating parameters that govern them — injection depth, unloading sequence, valve port size, injection gas pressure, and the split between continuous and intermittent lift. This scope pulls 368 published records dated between 2015 and mid-2026 that combine hardware terms with operational-control terms, so it captures both the physical valve/mandrel assemblies and the methods for sequencing and allocating injection gas across a well or field.
Publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, so the 2025 and 2026 counts in the trend below are still filling in and should not be read as a slowdown in real filing activity.
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Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 368 records: how filing volume has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses the claims fall into. Both are drawn directly from the records in scope, with no recomputation.
Filing trend, 2017–2026
Filings rose from 12 in 2017 to a peak of 23 in 2022, then eased to 9 by 2024 — a -10% move across the 2021-to-2024 span that is the most recent period with reliable, near-complete counts. 2025 and 2026 figures will revise upward as publication catches up.
IPC subclass distribution
E21B (earth and rock drilling / wells) appears in 95.1% of the 368 records, confirming this is fundamentally a wellbore-hardware field. Secondary classes — F04F pumping (10.9%), F16K valves and taps (4.6%), H04B transmission (3.8%) and F04B positive-displacement pumps (3.3%) — mark where gas lift claims cross into pumping, valving and telemetry disciplines. Classes below 2%, such as G01K temperature measurement, B01D separation and C09K materials, are thin enough to flag as adjacent rather than core.
Shares are the percentage of the 368 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Gas Lift Design and Operation with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about gas lift design and operation and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaA representative filing and what it covers
US7213607B2 — Mandrel for a gas lift valve
The mandrel comprises an elongated body with connection means at its ends, a side pocket and a side receptacle housing a gas lift valve that injects gas into the mandrel body through orifices positioned in a nose. A lower body sits on the lower part of the valve receptacle, refining how the valve seats and how gas is directed once injected.Filed by Petrobras; granted 2007-05-08.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US5172717A | Well control system | 259 |
| 2 | US5707214A | Nozzle-venturi gas lift flow control device and method for improving production rate, lift efficiency, and st… | 183 |
| 3 | US20050149264A1 | System and Method to Interpret Distributed Temperature Sensor Data and to Determine a Flow Rate in a Well | 161 |
| 4 | US20020036085A1 | Toroidal choke inductor for wireless communication and control | 133 |
| 5 | US4211279A | Plunger lift system | 111 |
| 6 | US4295795A | Method for forming remotely actuated gas lift systems and balanced valve systems made thereby | 104 |
| 7 | US4711306A | Gas lift system | 94 |
| 8 | US5797453A | Apparatus for kicking over tool and method | 79 |
| 9 | US20050199391A1 | System and method for optimizing production in an artificially lifted well | 72 |
| 10 | US4347899A | Downhold injection of well-treating chemical during production by gas lift | 72 |
Citation counts favour older filings simply because they have had longer to accumulate citations inside the searched corpus — read them as a signal of influence on the field's vocabulary, not as a ranking of current commercial importance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Browse MCP servers →What the data means for a filing decision
Three patterns worth acting on before drafting or clearing a new application in this space.
The top of the field is genuinely concentrated
The five leading assignees hold 123 of the 368 records in scope, and the top ten extend that to 177 — 48.1% of everything published. That is a narrower field than the raw assignee count of 100 ranked companies suggests; most of that ranking is a long tail of single or few-filing entrants.
Filing volume has come off its 2022 peak
2022 was the high-water mark at 23 filings; by 2024, the last year with reliable counts, volume had settled to 9, matching the -10% move measured from 2021's 10 filings. That reads as a maturing claim space rather than an exiting one — leaders are still filing, just not accelerating.
Nearly every record sits in wellbore hardware
E21B's near-universal presence confirms gas lift is claimed primarily as wellbore equipment, with valving (F16K, 4.6%), pumping (F04F, 10.9%; F04B, 3.3%) and telemetry (H04B, 3.8%) as secondary, cross-disciplinary layers rather than separate claim territories.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to gas lift design and operation, with the prior art for and against each one.
Assignee landscape and where the openings sit
A ranked field of 100 companies, with volume concentrated at the top and a long tail below it. Recent-year momentum has flattened across even the largest filers, which changes how a new entrant should think about clearance.
One filer sits well ahead of the field
The leading assignee holds 35 records against a fifth-place figure of 20 and a tenth-place figure of 9 — a steep drop-off that marks this as a leader-and-field structure rather than an even spread.
Even top assignees show zero latest-year activity
Several of the largest historical filers, including major oilfield service names, show zero filings in the latest year captured, with one showing a -100% YoY move. Given the ~18-month publication lag, this likely reflects filings still working through the pipeline rather than an actual pause.
Co-filing is rare and mostly company-inventor pairs
Only 10 co-assignee pairs appear across the dataset, and the strongest pairings link a corporate assignee to a named inventor rather than two companies jointly filing — collaboration between separate organisations is not a defining feature of this field.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Baker Hughes Oilfield Operations LLC | 0 | -100% |
| Petroleo Brasileiro S.A. – Petrobras | 0 | — |
| Weatherford Technology Holdings LLC | 0 | — |
| VALENCE OPERATING CO | 0 | — |
| Next Gen Services Innovation Program LLC | 0 | — |
| Halliburton Company | 0 | — |
| Otis Engineering Corp | 0 | — |
| Weatherford Lamb Inc | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to a concentrated leader tier, a cooling but not collapsing filing rate, and a handful of thin IPC branches. Turning that into a filing or clearance decision means going record-by-record from here.
Map claim scope against the leader tier
Start with the assignees holding the top 33.4% of records before drafting near valve port sizing, unloading sequence or injection rate allocation claims.
Explore assignee claims in EurekaCheck the thin IPC branches for openings
Classes under 5% of records, like F16K valving and G01K temperature sensing, are where a well-drafted claim has more room to stand alone.
Run a white space search in EurekaTrack momentum, not just headcount
Recent-year zeros at major filers may just be pipeline lag; recheck this cohort as later publication years fill in.
Set up a filing-trend alert in EurekaCommon questions on gas lift patents
The dataset shows a leader-and-field structure: the top assignee holds 35 of the 368 records in scope, well ahead of the fifth-ranked filer at 20 and the tenth-ranked filer at 9. The top five assignees together account for 33.4% of all records, and the top ten reach 48.1% — so roughly half the field's output traces back to a handful of companies, with a long tail of single-digit filers making up the rest of the 100 ranked assignees.
Filing volume peaked at 23 in 2022 and eased to 9 by 2024, a -10% move from 2021's 10 filings, which is the most reliable recent comparison because publication typically lags filing by about 18 months. That makes 2025 and 2026 counts artificially low rather than evidence of an actual drop-off. Read the pattern as a field settling after a 2022 filing surge, not as companies abandoning the technology.
Nearly all records, 95.1% of the 368 in scope, fall under E21B (earth and rock drilling / wells), confirming that gas lift is claimed primarily as wellbore hardware. Beneath that, pumping-related claims (F04F at 10.9%, F04B at 3.3%), valve and tap mechanisms (F16K at 4.6%) and transmission/telemetry (H04B at 3.8%) form a secondary layer where gas lift intersects with adjacent equipment disciplines.
The classification data points to several thinly claimed branches: temperature-sensing-based flow interpretation, wireless downhole telemetry for valve control, intermittent-lift plunger timing, and valve-seat materials each sit under 5% of the 368 records. These are not empty categories, but they carry far less claim density than the core mandrel and valve hardware, which is where a narrowly drafted claim has more room to stand without colliding with the leader tier's existing filings.
US7213607B2, assigned to Petrobras and granted in 2007, claims a specific mandrel configuration combining a side pocket, a side receptacle housing the gas lift valve, and a lower body positioned beneath the valve receptacle. It constrains designs that replicate that exact structural arrangement, but it does not foreclose alternative mandrel geometries, different valve-seating approaches, or operational-control claims around injection depth and sequencing that sit outside its specific structural claims. A design-around review should compare the claimed lower-body and orifice arrangement against any new mandrel geometry element by element.
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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.