Liquid Crystal Polymer Curing Process Patents: Leaders & Trends 2026
- Filing has cooled since its 2021 peak. 23 families that year against a 2022 midpoint of just 5, with 2026 (partial) at 2 — a mature, declining filing curve rather than an emerging one.
- Claim space concentrates in three IPC subclasses. C08L (182), C08G (132) and C08J (105) records dominate, meaning composition and condensation-chemistry claims are the most heavily occupied ground.
- Momentum has stalled even among the historic leaders. Every top assignee tracked — including Kuraray and Celanese — shows zero filings in the latest year, consistent with a settled rather than contested field.
What this landscape covers
This landscape tracks patent families combining liquid crystal polymer composition claims with curing-adjacent process language — melt processing, annealing, heat treatment and solid-state polymerization — across IPC classes C08L67, B29C71 and C08G63. The corpus spans 308 patent families published between 2015 and mid-2026, giving a working view of how curing and post-treatment claims have been staked out around thermotropic LCP chemistries.
Because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the 2025-2026 counts in the trend chart understate actual filing activity; treat the last one to two years as a floor, not a ceiling.
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 308-family corpus: how filing volume has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses carry the claim density.
A peak in 2021, then a fall-off
Filings rose from 7 in 2017 to a peak of 23 in 2021, then dropped sharply — 5 at the 2022 midpoint and just 2 recorded so far in 2026. That shape points to a technology whose core curing methods were staked out early in the window and have not attracted a second wave of filers since.
Composition and condensation chemistry dominate
C08L (polymer compositions) leads at 182 records, ahead of C08G (condensation polymers) at 132 and C08J (polymer processing and solutions) at 105. B32B laminates, C09K functional materials and H05K printed-circuit assemblies trail behind, marking the downstream application areas where LCP curing intersects packaging and electronics rather than base chemistry.
Shares are the percentage of the 308 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Liquid Crystal Polymer Curing Process with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about liquid crystal polymer curing process and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe records other filings cite most
Method of making liquid crystal polymer films (US7740790B2)
The patent describes continuously heat-treating a thermotropic LCP film while it remains joined to a sheet-like support member, then separating the film once treatment is complete. Heating runs for 5 to 60 seconds at a temperature at or above the polymer's melting point, with the support member providing dimensional control through the heat-treatment step.Abstract text is drawn directly from the granted patent; claim scope should be confirmed against the full claim set before relying on this summary.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | WO1993001227A1 | Thermotropic liquid crystal segmented block copolymer | 233 |
| 2 | US5275877A | Self reinforced thermoplastic composite laminate | 170 |
| 3 | US6114492A | Process for producing liquid crystal polymer | 168 |
| 4 | US5616680A | Process for producing liquid crystal polymer | 166 |
| 5 | US5719354A | Monolithic LCP polymer microelectronic wiring modules | 159 |
| 6 | US4468364A | Process for extruding thermotropic liquid crystalline polymers | 134 |
| 7 | US6274242B1 | Liquid crystal polymer film, laminate, method of making them and multi-layered parts-mounted circuit board | 126 |
| 8 | US5268225A | Self reinforced thermoplastic composite laminate | 81 |
| 9 | US6010760A | Thermoplastic resin composition, injection molding method thereof, and injection molded article | 61 |
| 10 | US5529740A | Process for treating liquid crystal polymer film | 58 |
Citation counts favour older filings simply because they have had more time to accumulate citations within the searched corpus — read them as a signal of influence on the field, not of current commercial relevance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Browse MCP servers →What the filing pattern says about the field
Reading the trend and the citation data together points to a field that consolidated early and has not reopened.
The wave has passed
Filings climbed for four years and then fell off sharply after the 2021 peak. A 2022 midpoint of only 5 families suggests the drop is structural, not a one-year dip, and the partial 2026 count is consistent with continued decline once the publication lag is accounted for.
Foundational art sits in the 1990s
The most-cited record in the corpus, a thermotropic segmented block copolymer filing, dates back to the early 1990s and still anchors citation counts decades later. Three of the five most-cited records concern the core process of producing liquid crystal polymer itself, not downstream shaping or lamination.
Leaders have gone quiet
Every assignee with historically strong filing volume in this dataset — spanning Japanese, US and Chinese entities — shows zero recorded filings in the most recent year. That is consistent with a field where core curing methods are already claimed and further filing has shifted to adjacent applications.
Collaboration is rare and asymmetric
Only eight co-assignee pairs appear across the corpus. One pairing, between Kuraray and Celanese, accounts for ten joint filings — far more than any other pair — while the remaining collaborations are limited to one or two filings each.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to liquid crystal polymer curing process, with the prior art for and against each one.
| Assignee | Co-assignee | Shared families |
|---|---|---|
| Kuraray Co., Ltd. | Celanese Corporation | 10 |
| Kingfa Sci. & Tech. Co., Ltd. | Zhuhai Wintus Special Engineering Plastics Co., Ltd. | 2 |
| Celanese Corporation | HNA Holding Group | 1 |
| Amoco Corporation | STERN BRIAN ALLEN | 1 |
| Amoco Corporation | MATZNER MARCUS | 1 |
| Amoco Corporation | LAYTON RICHARD | 1 |
| Amoco Corporation | HUSPENI PAUL JOSEPH | 1 |
| Amoco Corporation | FRAYER PAUL DAVID | 1 |
The Kuraray-Celanese pairing is the clear outlier in joint filing activity; all other identified co-assignee pairs are limited to one or two shared families.
Who holds the ground
Filing activity concentrates among a small group of chemicals and materials companies, most with roots in LCP resin production going back decades.
Kuraray
Kuraray's representative filing on continuous heat-treatment of LCP film sits among the most-referenced process patents in this corpus, and the company also anchors the strongest co-assignee pairing identified in the data. Its latest-year filing count, like every other tracked leader, is zero.
Celanese
Celanese pairs with Kuraray in the strongest co-assignee relationship in the dataset, at ten joint families — well ahead of any other collaboration identified. Like the rest of the historic leader group, its recorded filing activity in the latest year is zero.
Chinese engineering-plastics filers
Assignees such as Kingfa Sci. & Tech. and Zhuhai Wintus appear together in a smaller co-assignee pairing, reflecting a domestic Chinese engineering-plastics supply chain building LCP curing know-how alongside the established Japanese and US incumbents.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Kuraray Co., Ltd. | 0 | — |
| Celanese Corporation | 0 | — |
| University of Akron | 0 | — |
| Polyplastics Co., Ltd. | 0 | — |
| Ticona LLC | 0 | — |
| Denka Company Limited | 0 | — |
| Amoco Corporation | 0 | — |
| University of Massachusetts | 0 | — |
Where to take this
The trend and ownership data point to a field where the core process art is settled; the open questions now sit at the edges.
Check freedom to operate against the top-cited process patents
The five most-cited records in this corpus cover core LCP production and film-forming methods, not just composition. Any new curing process should be checked against these before development spend commits to a specific temperature or timing window.
Explore prior art in EurekaLook at the application-layer IPC classes for open claim space
B32B, C09K and H05K carry far fewer records than the core C08L/C08G/C08J classes, suggesting curing claims tied to laminate bonding or circuit substrates are less contested than base polymer chemistry.
Map white space in EurekaCommon questions on LCP curing process patents
In this landscape, a record has to combine liquid crystal polymer or thermotropic LCP composition language with process terms tied to curing or post-treatment, such as melt processing, annealing, heat treatment or solid-state polymerization. It also has to sit within IPC classes covering polymer compositions, shaping of plastics, or condensation polymer chemistry (C08L67, B29C71, C08G63). Patents that only cover LCP composition without a curing-related process step, or process patents unrelated to LCP chemistry, fall outside this definition.
The data shows filings rising from 7 in 2017 to a peak of 23 in 2021, then falling to 5 by the 2022 midpoint and continuing lower through the partial 2026 count. This pattern typically indicates that the core process methods were claimed during the run-up to the peak, after which later filers found less open ground to stake. Part of the apparent 2025-2026 decline is also a publication-lag artefact, since granted patents typically publish around 18 months after filing, so very recent activity is not yet fully visible.
Kuraray and Celanese are the two most prominent names in this corpus, both in individual filing history and in the strongest identified co-assignee relationship, with ten joint filings between them. Other companies with a long history in LCP resin production, including Ticona and Polyplastics, also appear as historic filers. Notably, every one of the top historic assignees tracked in this dataset shows zero filings in the latest year, indicating the leadership group has gone quiet rather than being displaced by a new entrant.
Yes, though it sits at the edges rather than in the core chemistry. IPC subclasses covering laminates (B32B), specialty materials (C09K) and printed circuit assemblies (H05K) carry substantially fewer records than the core composition and condensation-chemistry classes, suggesting curing processes tied to lamination, circuit substrate integration or filler-modified systems are less densely claimed. A first claim in these areas would likely need to tie a specific curing profile to a defined downstream structure, such as an LCP-laminate interface, rather than claiming the base curing chemistry itself.
Not necessarily. Citation counts accumulate over time, so older patents in a searched corpus will tend to show higher counts simply because they have had longer to be cited, as seen with the top-cited record in this dataset dating back to the early 1990s. A high citation count is better read as a signal of foundational influence on later filings than as evidence that the patent's specific claims remain commercially active or unavoidable today. Current relevance should be checked separately, for example against filing status, litigation history and the scope of the granted claims.
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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.