Marine Terminal Transfer Systems Patents: Who Leads 2026
- Concentrated at the top. The top 5 ranked assignees account for 32 of 33 records in scope (97.0%), with a sixth filer closing the field to 100.0%.
- Filing has already peaked. Activity rose to 9 records in 2022 before tapering off, with the partial 2026 count reflecting publication lag rather than a real drop.
- Nearly all activity sits under one class. B63B (ships & marine vessels) covers 93.9% of the 33 records, leaving propulsion, launching and dispensing classes each in single digits.
Top-5 share is the combined record count of the five largest assignees divided by all 33 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this landscape covers
Marine terminal transfer systems sit at the interface between ship and shore: single point mooring buoys, marine loading arms, floating hose strings and the emergency release couplings that let a cargo connection separate safely under upset conditions. This dataset pulls together 33 published records filed between 2015 and mid-2026 that combine mooring or jetty transfer hardware with a safety, coupling or relative-motion-compensation mechanism.
The field is small and old at its core. Its most-cited records date to the early 1980s and early 2000s, and the current filing population is thin enough that six assignees account for every record in the ranking. That combination — a foundational prior art base plus a narrow, active filer set — is the shape a freedom-to-operate review needs to understand before scoping new claims.
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Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 33 records: how filing activity has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses the records fall into.
Filing trend, 2017–2026
Filings rose from 3 records in 2017 to a peak of 9 in 2022, then eased off. The 2026 figure of 0 is a partial year and understates real activity, since publication typically lags filing by around 18 months.
IPC subclass distribution
B63B (ships & marine vessels) appears in 93.9% of the 33 records, making it the default classification for nearly the entire field. B63H (marine propulsion & steering), B63C (launching & salvaging), B67D (dispensing liquids) and F17C (pressure vessels & gas storage) each sit at 15.2% or below, marking them as secondary or supporting classifications rather than separate filing centres.
Shares are the percentage of the 33 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Marine Terminal Transfer Systems with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about marine terminal transfer systems and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe records other filings cite
EP0079404A1 — A single point mooring buoy with rigid arm
The buoy and rigid arm are free to rotate about the buoy's vertical axis. The rigid arm connects to the mooring buoy through a hinge arrangement and an axial rotational connection, allowing independent pitch and roll motion between buoy and arm. The vessel connects to the rigid arm through two tension members, and the arm carries ballast at the vessel end, with an optional conventional hawser as a backup connection.Filed 1983 by Bluewater Terminal Systems N.V.; the most-cited record in this dataset at 20 citations.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US6688348B2 | Submerged flowline termination buoy with direct connection to shuttle tanker | 33 |
| 2 | US20030084960A1 | Submerged flowline termination buoy with direct connection to shuttle tanker | 20 |
| 3 | EP0079404A1 | A single point mooring buoy with rigid arm | 20 |
| 4 | US20190233058A1 | Method and system for heading control during ship-to-ship transfer of LNG | 9 |
| 5 | WO2018064598A1 | Method and system for heading control during ship-to-ship transfer of LNG | 7 |
| 6 | EP0079404B1 | A single point mooring buoy with rigid arm | 4 |
| 7 | EP0079404B2 | A single point mooring buoy with rigid arm | 4 |
| 8 | WO2023062206A1 | A transfer system for transferring a medium between facilities | 2 |
| 9 | GB2570403A | Ship-to-ship transfer of hydrocarbon liquids | 2 |
| 10 | US10549820B2 | Method and system for heading control during ship-to-ship transfer of LNG | 2 |
Citation counts favour older records simply because they have had longer to accumulate citations inside this corpus; treat them as a measure of influence on the field's vocabulary, not of current technical relevance.
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 strategy
Three findings that shape where new claims can realistically sit in this field.
A narrow, closed filer set
With the top 5 ranked assignees covering 32 of 33 records and a sixth completing the set at 100.0%, this is not a field with a long tail of opportunistic filers. Anyone assessing freedom to operate needs to clear claims from a short, known list rather than scan for scattered independent filings.
Activity has already crested
Filings built steadily from 3 records in 2017 to a peak of 9 in 2022 before declining. Because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, the apparent drop toward 2026 partly reflects records not yet published rather than a genuine slowdown in R&D.
One class dominates, but overlaps exist
Almost every record in scope sits in B63B, the general marine vessels class. Smaller shares in propulsion, launching/salvaging, liquid dispensing and pressure-vessel classes show where transfer-system claims cross into adjacent equipment, but none of these secondary classes represents a distinct filing centre of its own.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to marine terminal transfer systems, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who holds the claims
Six assignees account for the entire ranked field, with filing sharply concentrated at the top and no recent-year activity recorded for any of them in the latest partial year.
The largest single filer
The leading assignee holds 11 of the 33 records in scope, the largest share of any single filer and more than a third of the entire dataset on its own.
A steep drop after the leaders
Filing volume falls off quickly after the top few assignees: fifth place holds only 2 records, underscoring how tightly this field is held by a small group rather than spread across many competitors.
No fresh filings recorded yet
Every ranked assignee shows 0 records in the latest year. Given the roughly 18-month publication lag, this reads as a reporting gap rather than a sign that active filers have stopped working in the space.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| ECONNECT ENERGY AS | 0 | — |
| FUTURE MARINE SERVICES LTD | 0 | — |
| Bluewater Terminal Systems | 0 | — |
| Excelerate Energy LP | 0 | — |
| FMC Technologies, Inc. (US) | 0 | — |
| iConnect Energy AS | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to a concentrated, mature core with narrow but real openings at its edges.
Check freedom to operate against the top filers
With 97.0% of records held by five assignees, a targeted FTO review of that short list will cover nearly the whole active claim space more efficiently than a broad search.
Run a freedom-to-operate check in EurekaWatch for the 2026 publication catch-up
The apparent decline toward 2026 is partly a publication-lag artefact; revisit the trend once later filings publish to see whether activity actually held at 2022 levels.
Track filing trends in EurekaScope claims around the secondary IPC classes
Propulsion, launching/salvaging, dispensing and pressure-vessel overlaps each sit at 15.2% or below, suggesting room to file claims that combine transfer-system hardware with these adjacent mechanisms.
Explore white space in EurekaCommon questions on marine terminal transfer systems patents
The ranked field contains just 6 assignees, and it is heavily front-loaded: the leader holds 11 of the 33 records in scope, while fifth place holds only 2. Together the top 5 assignees account for 97.0% of all records, and the sixth closes the field to 100.0%. This means a competitive review can focus on a small, known group rather than a broad market scan.
Filings rose from 3 records in 2017 to a peak of 9 in 2022, then appeared to decline toward 2026. Because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the most recent years understate real activity, and the apparent drop should not be read as a confirmed slowdown until later filings publish. The safest read is that activity peaked around 2022 and has plateaued rather than collapsed.
EP0079404A1 describes a single point mooring buoy with a rigid arm that can rotate independently of the buoy through a hinge and axial rotational connection, accommodating pitch and roll motion between vessel and buoy. Filed in 1983 by Bluewater Terminal Systems N.V., it is the most-cited record in this dataset at 20 citations, making it a foundational reference for rigid-arm mooring designs. Anyone designing a new mooring arm connection mechanism should review its claim scope before finalising a hinge or tension-member arrangement.
Secondary IPC classes point to the openings: propulsion and steering (B63H) appears in 15.2% of records, while launching/salvaging (B63C), liquid dispensing (B67D) and pressure vessel/gas storage (F17C) each sit at 6.1%. These lower shares suggest that combining core transfer-system hardware with relative motion compensation, cargo pump integration, or floating hose monitoring is less crowded than the core mooring and loading-arm claims themselves.
Start with B63B (ships & marine vessels), which covers 93.9% of the 33 records in this dataset and functions as the default classification for the field. Then check B63H for propulsion and steering overlaps, B63C for launching and salvaging mechanisms, B67D for liquid dispensing, and F17C for pressure vessel and gas storage claims, since each of these appears in a meaningful minority of records and can surface adjacent prior art missed by a B63B-only search.
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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.