Intense Pulsed Light Patents: Who Leads, Where the Gaps Are 2026
- Top-heavy but not locked down. the leading assignee holds 25 of 226 records, yet the ranked field runs 71 companies deep with a long tail of single or double filers.
- Filing has cooled since the 2022 peak of 20 records a year. 2021-to-2024 volume is down 40%, though 2025-2026 counts are still filling in under publication lag.
- Cooling and chromophore-targeting claims sit outside the two dominant classes. A61B and A61N together anchor the field while cosmetics-use and coating classes remain comparatively open.
Filing growth compares 2021 (5 records) with 2024 (3) — 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 226 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What the intense pulsed light patent record shows
Intense pulsed light (IPL) systems sit at the intersection of dermatological device engineering and consumer aesthetics, and the patent record reflects that split. Claims cluster around filter cutoff, pulse train control, chromophore targeting and epidermal cooling — the mechanisms that separate a safe, effective device from one that burns skin or fails to treat the intended tissue. Operator training and lamp lifetime claims appear too, marking the field’s shift from pure optics toward serviceability and clinical workflow.
The 226 records in scope span 2015 through the 2026 data cut-off, filed predominantly through the United States receiving office, with meaningful volume through the WIPO PCT route and the European and UK offices. That filing footprint points to a technology commercialised first in the US market before extending into Europe and the Commonwealth.
Filing trend and technology composition
Publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so the most recent one to two years in any chart will always look thinner than the underlying filing activity actually was.
Filings rose to a 2022 peak, then eased
Annual filings climbed from 9 records in 2017 to a peak of 20 in 2022, then declined through 2024, when the 2021-to-2024 window shows a 40% drop. Treat 2025 and 2026 as still filling in rather than as evidence the field has gone quiet.
A61B and A61N dominate; cosmetics and coatings trail
A61B (diagnosis and surgery) appears on 43.4% of the 226 records and A61N (electrotherapy and radiation therapy) on 35.8%, together forming the technical core of most IPL claims. A61F and A61K each sit at 10.6%, A61Q (cosmetics use) at 8.4%, and C23C coating claims and H05K circuit claims trail further back — smaller footprints that mark where device-adjacent claim space is less crowded.
Shares are the percentage of the 226 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Intense Pulsed Light Systems with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about intense pulsed light systems and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaRepresentative and most-cited filings
Eye safe dermatological phototherapy (US20050147137A1)
A method and apparatus are disclosed for improving bodily safety during exposure to an intense pulsed light source by diverging the light, such as with a diffuser. At a first position of the distal end of the light source the energy density of exit light is substantially equal to the energy density required for the intended aesthetic application, while at a second position the radiance emitted is significantly lower than that of the intense pulsed light itself, reducing exposure risk.Filed by Candela Corporation, granted priority 2005-07-07 — illustrates how early eye-safety and beam-divergence claims were staked out well before the 2015-2026 filing window this dataset covers.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US20070198004A1 | Photocosmetic device | 377 |
| 2 | US20070038206A1 | Photocosmetic device | 283 |
| 3 | US20070239142A1 | Photocosmetic device | 225 |
| 4 | US20040176754A1 | Method and device for sensing skin contact | 170 |
| 5 | US20070239143A1 | Photocosmetic device | 137 |
| 6 | WO2004080279A2 | In the patent cooperation treaty application for patent | 113 |
| 7 | US20070213698A1 | Photocosmetic device | 108 |
| 8 | US20070213696A1 | Photocosmetic device | 107 |
| 9 | US20140316387A1 | Ultrasound delivery of nanoparticles | 75 |
| 10 | WO2010110969A1 | Method for reducing thin films on low temperature substrates | 60 |
Citation counts favour older filings simply because they have had more time to accumulate citations inside a searched corpus; read them as a signal of influence on the field, not as a ranking of present-day importance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Browse MCP servers →What the numbers mean for a filing decision
Three patterns matter most for anyone deciding where to file next in intense pulsed light systems.
The top of the field is concentrated, the rest is fragmented
The leading assignee alone holds 25 records, and the top five together account for 39.8% of all 226 records in scope. Beyond that, the ranking runs 71 companies deep, with tenth place holding just 8 records — a long tail of smaller and single-filing entrants rather than a handful of gatekeepers.
Filing volume has cooled from its 2022 peak
Annual filings peaked at 20 records in 2022 and the 2021-to-2024 window shows a 40% decline. Because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, 2025 and 2026 figures are still incomplete and should not be read as a continued fall.
Core optics and electrotherapy claims dominate, cosmetics claims trail
A61B and A61N together anchor most IPL filings, covering the diagnostic, surgical and electrotherapy mechanics of pulsed light delivery. A61Q cosmetics-use claims sit at just 8.4% of records, and coating (C23C) and circuit (H05K) classes trail further, suggesting device-adjacent and formulation-adjacent claim space carries less prior art density.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to intense pulsed light systems, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who holds the ground, and where it opens up
No single assignee controls the field outright. The leader's 25 records set the pace, but momentum across the named top assignees has flattened to zero in the latest year, consistent with the broader slowdown in the trend data.
A single leader, no runaway share
The top-ranked assignee holds 25 of 226 records, well ahead of fifth place at 13 and tenth place at 8. That gap marks a real lead in filing volume, but 39.8% combined share for the top five leaves the majority of the field distributed elsewhere.
A deep, fragmented field below the leaders
The ranking returns 71 companies total, and the drop from top five (90 records, 39.8%) to top ten (137 records, 60.6%) shows the middle of the field adding smaller, incremental contributions rather than a second concentrated cluster.
Recent-year activity has gone quiet across the top assignees
Every named top assignee shows zero filings in the latest year, including one with a -100% year-on-year change. Given the roughly 18-month publication lag, this reads more as pipeline-in-progress than as leaders exiting the space.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| GUSTAVSSON MORGAN LARS AKE | 0 | — |
| Stroma Medical Corp | 0 | -100% |
| NCC Nano LLC | 0 | — |
| AOBIOME LLC | 0 | — |
| Candela Corp | 0 | — |
| Palomar Medical Technologies LLC | 0 | — |
| LYNTON LASERS | 0 | — |
| Koninklijke Philips N.V. (Royal Philips) | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to specific next steps depending on whether the goal is freedom-to-operate, licensing strategy or new filing.
Map claims against the under-claimed sub-areas
Filter cutoff, chromophore targeting and epidermal cooling show comparatively thinner density than the core A61B/A61N cluster — worth a claim-by-claim check before assuming the space is open.
Explore white space in EurekaTrack the leaders' pipeline, not just their granted filings
Zero latest-year filings across the named top assignees likely reflects publication lag rather than exit; monitoring pending applications gives an earlier read than granted-patent counts alone.
Set up assignee monitoring in EurekaBenchmark against the most-cited prior art
The most-cited records date back to earlier photocosmetic device filings; any new filing in eye-safety or beam-divergence claims should be checked against that citation cluster first.
Review cited prior art in EurekaCommon questions on intense pulsed light patents
The ranked field covers 71 companies, with the leading assignee holding 25 of the 226 records in scope. The top five assignees combined hold 39.8% of all records, and the top ten hold 60.6%, so while there is a clear leader, the majority of filings are spread across a long tail of smaller and single-filing entrants. This structure means a freedom-to-operate search needs to go well beyond the top few names to be reliable.
Filings rose from 9 records in 2017 to a peak of 20 in 2022, then the 2021-to-2024 window shows a 40% decline. However, patent publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, so the 2025 and 2026 figures in any dataset are still incomplete and should not be read as proof the field is cooling further. The safest read is that 2022 was a genuine peak and the field has since normalised to a lower but still active pace.
A61B, covering diagnosis and surgery, appears on 43.4% of the 226 records, and A61N, covering electrotherapy and radiation therapy, appears on 35.8%. These two classes form the technical backbone of most IPL claims, covering pulse delivery and treatment mechanics. Cosmetics-use claims under A61Q sit at just 8.4%, and coating and circuit-related classes trail further, indicating those areas carry less filing density.
Based on the IPC composition, sub-areas like adjustable filter cutoff modules, chromophore-targeting wavelength selection, epidermal cooling contact sensing, operator-training interfaces and lamp lifetime monitoring show comparatively thinner claim density than the dominant A61B and A61N cluster. That does not guarantee those areas are unclaimed, but it does mean prior art searches there are likely to surface fewer blocking references than a straightforward pulse-delivery claim would. A detailed claim chart against the specific IPC subclass is the necessary next step before filing.
US20050147137A1, assigned to Candela Corporation with a 2005 priority date, discloses a method for improving eye safety during intense pulsed light exposure by diverging the light with a diffuser, so that energy density drops sharply away from the treatment position. It matters because eye-safety and beam-divergence mechanics are foundational to any IPL device design, and this filing predates the 2015-2026 window covered by this dataset, meaning its claims may already constrain how newer eye-safety features can be structured. Anyone designing a new IPL safety mechanism should check this filing specifically rather than relying on the general citation cluster around it.
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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.
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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.