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Run your analysis now →https://www.patsnap.com/resources/blog/rd-blog/medical-imaging-mri-low-field-mri-patent-landscape/ · Patsnap · data cut-off 2026-07-31 · downloaded from the live page
Patent Landscape · Biomedical DevicesLow-Field MRI Patents: Mapping Who Leads Portable and Permanent-Magnet Imaging
- Filing has cooled since its 2020 peak. 124 families filed that year against 61 in 2017 and only 3 recorded for 2026 so far, with the 2022 midpoint at 50 — a plateau rather than a runaway trend.
- One family of related entities dominates co-filing. The strongest co-assignee pairings all trace back to Hyperfine-linked entities, each pairing appearing 20-28 times — a tighter cluster than the rest of the field shows.
- Claim activity concentrates in two IPC subclasses. G01R electric/magnetic measurement (801 records) and A61B diagnosis/surgery (531) dwarf adjacent classes like G06N AI computing (58) and G06V image recognition (50).
911
Published Records
62%
Top-5 Share of All Records
-38%
Filing Growth 2021→2024
US
Leading Jurisdiction
Filing growth compares 2021 (58 records) with 2024 (36) — 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 911 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
Published byPatsnap Research··8 min readSourced from Patsnap Eureka
Overview
What the low-field MRI patent record actually shows
Low-field and portable MRI patenting sits at the intersection of hardware miniaturisation and image reconstruction. The search set spans 911 patent families filed between 2015 and mid-2026, concentrated under IPC classes for magnetic resonance measurement and clinical diagnosis apparatus. Filing activity rose through the late 2010s, peaked in 2020 at 124 families, and has since eased toward a lower, steadier level — a pattern consistent with a field that has moved past its initial hardware land-grab and into incremental refinement.
Because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, the 2025 and 2026 figures in any trend chart understate real filing activity; treat the most recent one to two years as a floor, not a ceiling. The receiving-office split — led by the United States, followed by the EPO and WIPO's PCT route — signals that applicants are still pursuing broad multi-jurisdiction protection even as the pace of new filings slows.
Filing volume by year, 2017-2026
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee ranking and totals. Derived from a Patsnap search on Medical Imaging MRI Low-Field MRI covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
The Numbers
Filing trends and technology composition
Two views of the same 911-family dataset: how filing volume has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses carry the claim density.
A 2020 peak followed by a decline
Filings climbed from 61 in 2017 to a peak of 124 in 2020, fell back to 50 at the 2022 midpoint, and have continued lower since — a flat-to-declining trajectory rather than sustained growth. Read the tail end of the chart with the 18-month publication lag in mind.
Measurement and diagnosis claims dominate
G01R (electric and magnetic measurement) appears in 801 records and A61B (diagnosis and surgery) in 531, together anchoring the field. Supporting classes — H01F magnets and transformers (111), G06T image processing (73), A61G patient transport (70), G06N AI computing (58), A61N electrotherapy (54) and G06V image recognition (50) — are each claimed far less densely, marking them as the field's secondary, less-crowded layers.
Shares are the percentage of the 911 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Filing trend and technology composition. Derived from a Patsnap search on Medical Imaging MRI Low-Field MRI covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.
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The documents anchoring this landscape
Representative Filing
Artefact reduction in magnetic resonance imaging (NZ787530A)
HYPERFINE OPERATIONS, INC.
MRI provides an important imaging modality for numerous applications and is widely utilized in clinical and research settings to produce images of the inside of the human body. As a generality, MRI is based on detecting magnetic resonance (MR) signals, which are electromagnetic waves emitted by atoms in response to state changes resulting from applied electromagnetic fields. The present application relates generally to techniques for reducing artefacts in magnetic resonance images resulting from eddy currents and/or movement of the subject during imaging, that may degrade overall image quality. The present disclosure relates to a method of operating a low-field magnetic resonance imaging (MRFiled by Hyperfine Operations; abstract truncated as published.
View full filingMost-cited records in the corpus
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US8812077B2 | System and method for image guidance during medical procedures | 343 |
| 2 | US5964705A | MR-compatible medical devices | 339 |
| 3 | US20110118588A1 | Combination MRI and Radiotherapy Systems and Methods of Use | 223 |
| 4 | US9817093B2 | Low field magnetic resonance imaging methods and apparatus | 151 |
| 5 | US6317618B1 | Transportable intraoperative magnetic resonance imaging apparatus | 149 |
| 6 | US10222434B2 | Portable magnetic resonance imaging methods and apparatus | 147 |
| 7 | US5436607A | Open (non-enclosed) magnets for magnetic resonance imaging | 141 |
| 8 | US20180143274A1 | Low-field magnetic resonance imaging methods and apparatus | 136 |
| 9 | US20180143280A1 | Low-field magnetic resonance imaging methods and apparatus | 134 |
| 10 | US20120165652A1 | System and method for image guidance during medical procedures | 131 |
Citation counts favour older filings simply by virtue of time in the corpus; read them as a marker of influence on the field's vocabulary, not of current commercial weight.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Citation counts and representative records. Derived from a Patsnap search on Medical Imaging MRI Low-Field MRI covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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What the data means for filing strategy
Three patterns stand out once volume, citation weight and co-filing behaviour are laid side by side.
Filing Pace
124 → 3
2020 peak vs. 2026 partial-year count
The hardware land-grab has passed its peak
Volume peaked in 2020 and has trended down since, with the 2022 midpoint already back to 50. That does not mean the technology is exhausted — it means the initial wave of foundational hardware claims has largely been staked, and later entrants are filing into occupied claim space.
Read the 2025-2026 tail as understated, not as a real collapse.
Citation Weight
343 citations
Top-cited record (US8812077B2)
Influence sits with older, broader filings
The most-cited records date from the 2000s and early 2010s and cover broad ground — image-guided procedures, MR-compatible devices, combination imaging/therapy systems. Newer low-field-specific filings, such as US9817093B2, carry meaningfully fewer citations simply because they have had less time in the corpus.
Citation rank favours age; use it to trace lineage, not current relevance.
Assignee Structure
20-28 co-filings
Strongest co-assignee pairs
One corporate cluster co-files far more than anyone else
All three strongest co-assignee pairings in the dataset link entities within the same corporate family, each appearing between 20 and 28 times. That level of internal co-filing is unusual against a field with only 10 recorded co-assignee pairs in total, and it marks a single organisation as the structural core of the portable/low-field segment.
Momentum data shows recent activity from this cluster has slowed to zero in the latest year.
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Looking for what nobody has claimed yet?
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to medical imaging mri low-field mri, with the prior art for and against each one.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Co-assignee relationships and derived observations. Derived from a Patsnap search on Medical Imaging MRI Low-Field MRI covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
Players
Who is filing, and who has stalled
Assignee-level filing counts identify the field's structural leaders; year-over-year momentum shows several of them, including the strongest co-filers, recording zero filings in the latest tracked year.
Concentration
10 pairs
Total co-assignee pairs recorded
A small, tightly linked leadership core
Co-filing in this field is rare overall — only 10 pairs across 911 families — and the pairs that do exist cluster almost entirely around one corporate family's related entities. That concentration suggests most other assignees file independently rather than through joint ventures or shared R&D structures.
Independent filers make up the long tail behind this core.
Momentum
0 filings
Latest-year count for several leading assignees
Recent activity has gone quiet across the board
Every assignee tracked for year-over-year momentum, including the dominant co-filing cluster and other named entities, shows zero filings in the most recent year, several with a recorded -100% YoY change. Given the roughly 18-month publication lag, this likely reflects reporting delay more than an actual stop in R&D.
Treat the latest year as a floor on real activity, not a ceiling.
Geography
416 filings
United States receiving office count
Filing strategy still centres on the US, then Europe and PCT
The United States receives more than twice the filings of the next office (EPO, 154), with WIPO's PCT route close behind at 109. Smaller but notable volumes at IL, Australia and Canada suggest a secondary tier of jurisdictions where applicants seek protection once a US or PCT filing is in place.
IL's 46 filings are a comparatively strong showing for a market of its size.
Recent-year filing momentum by assignee
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Hyperfine Research, Inc. | 0 | — |
| Hyperfine, Inc. | 0 | — |
| Hyperfine Operations, Inc. | 0 | -100% |
| General Electric Healthcare (GE Healthcare) | 0 | — |
| Shanghai United Imaging Healthcare Co., Ltd. | 0 | -100% |
| Neuro42, Inc. | 0 | -100% |
| Aspect Imaging Ltd. | 0 | — |
| Siemens Healthineers GmbH | 0 | — |
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee-level momentum. Derived from a Patsnap search on Medical Imaging MRI Low-Field MRI covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
What's Next
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to a field with an established hardware core and several lighter-claimed branches worth a closer look before committing a filing strategy.
Stress-test a claim against the dense core
G01R and A61B carry the heaviest claim density in this field. Before drafting in either subclass, check freedom-to-operate against the highest-cited records rather than assuming open space.
Run a claim comparison in EurekaTrack the dominant co-filing cluster's next move
One corporate family accounts for the strongest co-assignee pairings in the dataset, yet shows zero filings in the latest tracked year. Watching for its next filing is a reasonable early signal for where the segment moves next.
Set up assignee monitoring in EurekaExplore the lighter-claimed adjacent branches
AI-driven reconstruction, patient-transport integration and combined-modality systems all show materially lower filing density than the measurement and diagnosis core. That gap is worth validating against your own technical roadmap.
Explore white space in EurekaSource: Patsnap Eureka. Forward-looking reading of the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Medical Imaging MRI Low-Field MRI covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
FAQ
Common questions about low-field MRI patents
The dataset shows one corporate family, built around Hyperfine-linked entities, as the structural core of the field — it accounts for the strongest co-assignee pairings recorded, each appearing 20 to 28 times against a total of only 10 co-assignee pairs in the whole dataset. Other named assignees, including General Electric Healthcare, United Imaging and Neuro42, appear in the ranking but with far less co-filing activity. Note that even the leading cluster shows zero filings in the most recent tracked year, which given the roughly 18-month publication lag likely reflects reporting delay rather than an actual halt.
No — filing peaked in 2020 at 124 families, fell to 50 by the 2022 midpoint, and has continued declining since, with only 3 filings recorded for 2026 so far. That is a flat-to-declining trend rather than sustained growth. The most recent one to two years should be read with caution, since publication typically lags actual filing by about 18 months, meaning true 2025-2026 activity is understated in any raw count.
US9817093B2, titled 'Low field magnetic resonance imaging methods and apparatus', is one of the most-cited records in this dataset with 151 citations, directly addressing low-field MRI hardware and methods rather than general MRI. It sits alongside older, more broadly-cited foundational patents like US8812077B2 and US5964705A, which cover image-guided procedures and MR-compatible devices generally. Its high citation count despite a later filing date suggests it functions as a key reference point specifically within the low-field sub-segment, distinct from the broader MRI prior art.
G01R (electric and magnetic measurement) and A61B (diagnosis and surgery) are by far the densest, appearing in 801 and 531 records respectively out of 911 total families — any new filing touching magnet design, field measurement or diagnostic apparatus will land in already-crowded claim space. Lighter but still relevant classes include H01F (magnets and transformers, 111 records), G06T (image processing, 73) and G06N (AI computing, 58). The gap between the two leading classes and the rest is where a freedom-to-operate search matters most before drafting.
Relative to the dense G01R/A61B core, AI-driven low-field image reconstruction, portable MRI patient-transport integration, combined MRI-electrotherapy systems, and point-of-care image recognition all show materially lower filing counts — G06N appears in only 58 records and G06V in 50, against 801 for G01R. That gap does not guarantee an easy filing, since some of these branches may be covered by claims filed under the dominant classes, but it marks areas where fewer direct competitors have staked dedicated claims. A targeted prior-art search in each branch is the reasonable next step before drafting.
Answers are grounded in the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Medical Imaging MRI Low-Field MRI covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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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.