Load Cells and Force Sensors Patents: Top Companies & Trends 2026
- Filing has cooled since 2019. The peak year was 2019 at 58 records, and the 2022 midpoint of 37 confirms a flat-to-declining trend rather than a temporary dip.
- No single company controls the field. The leader holds 48 records out of 1,253, and the top 5 combined reach only 16.2% of all records in scope — concentration is modest even at the front of the ranking.
- Weighing and force measurement dominate the IPC mix. G01L covers 84.4% of records and G01G covers 41.1%, while surgical (A61B, 4.1%) and vehicle (B60R, 3.1%) applications remain comparatively thin.
What this landscape covers
This dataset tracks 1,253 published records filed between 2015 and mid-2026 that combine load cell or force sensor terminology with technical claim language around creep and hysteresis, temperature compensation, overload protection, accuracy class, or digital load cell design, restricted to force and pressure measurement (G01L1), weighing (G01G3) and load-measuring device (G01L5) classifications. It captures the mechanical and electronic engineering work behind converting applied force into a usable signal — not general sensor technology, and not weighing systems built around other sensing principles.
Because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, the most recent year in the trend chart understates real filing activity and should be read as incomplete rather than as a genuine drop-off.
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Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 1,253 records: how filing volume has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses the claims actually sit in.
A field past its filing peak
Filings ran from 50 in 2017 to a peak of 58 in 2019, then eased toward 37 by the 2022 midpoint — a pattern consistent with a mature, incrementally-improved technology rather than one still attracting new entrants at scale.
Concentrated in force and weighing measurement
G01L (force & pressure measurement) appears on 84.4% of records and G01G (weighing) on 41.1%, confirming this corpus is anchored in classical load-cell engineering. Surgical (A61B), dimensional (G01B), vehicle (B60R) and data-processing (G06F) classes each sit under 5%, marking them as adjacent rather than core.
Shares are the percentage of the 1,253 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Load Cells and Force Sensors with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about load cells and force sensors and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe most-cited prior art in this space
US5841077A — Digital load cell assembly
A digital load cell assembly is disclosed. The digital load cell assembly includes at least one load cell for detecting an applied force and producing analog signals proportional to the applied force. The analog signals are transmitted along a cable assembly which is electrically connected to the load cell. The cable assembly has analog to digital circuitry and a power supply mounted on a printed circuit board, and is adapted to transmit digital signals representative of the force applied to the associated load cell for displaying a value corresponding to the applied force on an associated display indicator.Filed by Kolaci, Rudolph J.; granted 1998-11-24.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US5184319A | Force feedback and textures simulating interface device | 623 |
| 2 | US8561473B2 | Force sensor temperature compensation | 293 |
| 3 | US20140088614A1 | Force Sensor Temperature Compensation | 249 |
| 4 | US9549781B2 | Multi-force sensing surgical instrument and method of use for robotic surgical systems | 238 |
| 5 | US3695096A | Strain detecting load cell | 198 |
| 6 | US4815547A | Load cell | 175 |
| 7 | US4951510A | Multidimensional force sensor | 160 |
| 8 | US20150342695A1 | Multi-force sensing surgical instrument and method of use for robotic surgical systems | 116 |
| 9 | US4804052A | Compensated multiple load cell scale | 116 |
| 10 | US20080011091A1 | Method for measuring loading and temperature in structures and materials by measuring changes in natural freq… | 114 |
Citation counts inside a searched corpus favour older filings; treat this as a signal of influence on the field, not a ranking of current relevance.
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Browse MCP servers →What the numbers mean for a filing decision
Three read-throughs from the trend, the citation table and the receiving-office split.
The growth phase has passed
Volume peaked in 2019 and has trended down through the 2022 midpoint. New filings in this space are now more likely to be defensive refinements of temperature compensation, overload protection or digital signal-conditioning claims than attempts to stake out new ground.
Foundational art is decades old
The most-cited record dates to the early 1990s and the fifth-most-cited to 1971, both well outside the current filing window. Temperature-compensation claims specifically anchor two of the five most-cited records, marking that sub-area as heavily referenced prior art.
Filing is US-led but globally distributed
The United States leads receiving-office volume, followed by Europe, Japan, China, WIPO and the United Kingdom. A strategy built around a single jurisdiction misses the roughly half of activity split across the other five offices.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to load cells and force sensors, with the prior art for and against each one.
A fragmented field with no dominant leader
The ranking covers 100 companies counted by patent family. The leader holds 48 records; concentration at the top is modest by patent-landscape standards.
A clear leader, but not a lock
The top assignee's 48 records represent a meaningful lead over the field, but 48 out of 1,253 total records is well short of anything approaching control of the claim space.
The top 5 hold a minority share
Combined, the five highest-ranked assignees account for 16.2% of all records in scope. The remaining 83.8% is spread across a long tail of single- and few-filing entrants.
Extending the ranking adds share slowly
Going from five to ten ranked assignees adds only another 9.9 percentage points, from 16.2% to 26.1% of all records. That flat curve signals a genuinely fragmented competitive set rather than a few dominant players surrounded by noise.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Tokyo Electric Co., Ltd. | 0 | — |
| Mettler-Toledo LLC | 0 | — |
| Honda Motor Co., Ltd. | 0 | — |
| NextInput, Inc. | 0 | — |
| Toshiba Tec Corporation | 0 | — |
| Ishida Co., Ltd. | 0 | -100% |
| Weigh-Tronix, Inc. | 0 | — |
| Mettler-Toledo (Changzhou) Precision Instruments Co., Ltd. | 0 | — |
Where to take this
The dataset points to a mature but fragmented field with specific pockets of open claim space.
Check freedom-to-operate on temperature compensation
Two of the five most-cited records in this corpus claim temperature compensation specifically. Any new filing touching that mechanism should map against this prior art before drafting.
Explore in EurekaLook past the top 10 assignees
With the top 10 holding only 26.1% of records, the more informative competitive signal is often in the long tail of single-filing entrants working adjacent applications.
Run a custom searchWatch the under-claimed branches
Surgical, vehicle and MEMS-scale applications each sit under 5% of records despite being technically adjacent to the core — a sign of open claim space rather than lack of interest.
See white space analysisCommon questions about this landscape
The leading assignee in this dataset holds 48 of the 1,253 records in scope, ahead of the rest of the field. However, the top 5 assignees combined account for only 16.2% of all records, and the top 10 reach 26.1%, so no single company or small group controls the claim space. A freedom-to-operate review in this field needs to look well beyond the leading few names.
Filing activity peaked in 2019 at 58 records and had eased to 37 by the 2022 midpoint, indicating a flat-to-declining trend rather than continued growth. Because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, the most recent years in any such dataset will always look lower than they eventually turn out to be, but the multi-year decline from the 2019 peak predates that lag effect. Overall the pattern is consistent with a mature technology area seeing incremental rather than expansive filing.
G01L (force and pressure measurement) appears on 84.4% of the 1,253 records and G01G (weighing) on 41.1%, making these the two anchor classifications for the field. Because a single record can carry multiple IPC codes, these shares add up to more than 100% and should not be summed together as a total. Adjacent classes such as A61B (surgical, 4.1%), G01B (dimensional measurement, 3.8%) and B60R (vehicle parts, 3.1%) each cover a small minority of records and mark less-crowded territory.
US5841077A, granted in 1998 to Kolaci, Rudolph J., covers a digital load cell assembly combining a load cell producing analogue signals proportional to applied force with a cable-mounted printed circuit board carrying analogue-to-digital conversion circuitry and a power supply, transmitting a digital signal for display. Any new design following that same architecture — analogue sensing element, in-line A/D conversion, digital output to a display — needs to be checked against this claim scope specifically. Designs that move the conversion circuitry elsewhere, use a different signal path, or avoid the specific cable-assembly configuration described may sit outside its claims, but that determination requires a full claim-by-claim reading rather than the abstract alone.
Surgical force-sensing instrumentation (A61B, 4.1% of records), vehicle-mounted load sensing (B60R, 3.1%) and data-processing-linked calibration (G06F, 2.7%) each represent a small fraction of the corpus relative to the core G01L and G01G classifications. These lower percentages do not mean the applications are unimportant — several highly-cited records specifically address surgical force sensing — but they do mean fewer competing filings occupy that specific claim space today. Any team targeting these branches should still check the highest-cited records in the adjacent core classes, since foundational claims there can extend into these use cases.
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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.