Metallic Glass Mechanical Properties Patents: Leaders & Trends 2026
- Filing has cooled since its 2018 peak. 70 families filed that year against a flat-to-declining trend through 2022 (21), with the 2026 count still incomplete due to publication lag.
- C22C alloy claims dominate the IPC mix. 572 of 1,017 families sit in C22C alone, more than three times the next largest subclass, B22F powder metallurgy at 170.
- No tracked assignee shows momentum in the latest year. Every top assignee in the ranking, including California Institute of Technology and Liquidmetal Technologies, records zero filings in the most recent year — a signal of either a filing pause or reporting lag, not necessarily retreat.
A field built on alloy composition claims, now filing more slowly
Metallic glass mechanical properties patents cluster tightly around alloy composition under C22C, with secondary depth in powder metallurgy, casting and additive manufacturing routes used to process bulk metallic glass into usable parts. The dataset covers 1,017 patent families published between 2015 and mid-2026, filed mainly through the United States, with meaningful volume also routed through the EPO and WIPO’s PCT system.
Filing activity peaked in 2018 at 70 families and has since flattened, with the 2022 midpoint sitting at 21 — a pattern consistent with a technology that reached an early claims land-rush and has not seen a second wave of filing. Because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the most recent years in this trend understate true activity and should not be read as a hard decline yet.
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Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 1,017 families: when they were filed, and which IPC subclasses carry the claims.
Filings by year
Activity rose to a 2018 peak of 70 filings, dropped through the 2022 midpoint of 21, and the partial 2026 count reflects publication lag rather than a real stop in filing.
IPC subclass composition
C22C alloy claims account for 572 of 1,017 families — well over half the corpus — with powder metallurgy (B22F, 170), casting (B22D, 152) and additive manufacturing (B33Y, 101) forming the next tier of processing-route claims.
Shares are the percentage of the 1,017 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Metallic Glass Mechanical Properties with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about metallic glass mechanical properties and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaMost-cited records and a representative claim
Bulk metallic glass-based macroscale gears (US10941847B2)
The patent covers methods for fabricating bulk metallic glass gears where the gear thickness exceeds 3 mm or diameter exceeds 9 mm, selecting a bulk metallic glass composition based on design parameters so the resulting gear resists standard wear modes and brittle fracture at macroscale dimensions.Filed by California Institute of Technology, granted 2021-03-09.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US8921473B1 | Image making medium | 272 |
| 2 | US5567251A | Amorphous metal/reinforcement composite material | 244 |
| 3 | US4621031A | Composite material bonded by an amorphous metal, and preparation thereof | 215 |
| 4 | US20200257933A1 | Machine Learning to Accelerate Alloy Design | 186 |
| 5 | US20050084407A1 | Titanium group powder metallurgy | 183 |
| 6 | US6771490B2 | Metal frame for electronic hardware and flat panel displays | 179 |
| 7 | US9101979B2 | Methods for fabricating gradient alloy articles with multi-functional properties | 157 |
| 8 | US20050031843A1 | Multi-layer fire barrier systems | 150 |
| 9 | US5866254A | Amorphous metal/reinforcement composite material | 147 |
| 10 | US20150044084A1 | Methods for fabricating gradient alloy articles with multi-functional properties | 132 |
Citation counts favour older filings simply because they have had longer to accumulate citations inside this searched corpus; treat them as a signal of influence, 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 decision
Three read-throughs from the composition and trend data that matter more than the raw counts.
Composition claims are the dense zone
Well over half the corpus sits in C22C alloy composition. This is occupied claim space, not necessarily settled science — new entrants should expect to design around existing alloy families rather than file broad composition claims.
Powder, casting and additive manufacturing form a real second tier
Powder metallurgy, casting and 3D-printing routes each carry meaningful independent filing volume, suggesting processing method claims are a workable alternative to composition claims for new filers.
The leaderboard has gone quiet
Every assignee with strong historical volume, including the strongest co-filing pairs, shows zero filings in the most recent tracked year. Combined with the 18-month publication lag, this could reflect either a genuine pause or filings still working through the pipeline.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to metallic glass mechanical properties, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who holds the ground
Filing history is concentrated among a small set of research-linked assignees and their closest collaborators, with a long tail of single-filing entrants behind them.
California Institute of Technology and its named inventors
Caltech and inventor William L. Johnson anchor the strongest co-assignee pair in the dataset (20 shared families with Marios D. Demetriou), and Caltech itself pairs with Johnson in 18 more — a tight academic-to-industry filing cluster typical of foundational metallic glass work.
Liquidmetal Technologies and Atakan Peker
Liquidmetal Technologies' pairing with inventor Atakan Peker is the third-strongest co-assignee relationship in the corpus, reflecting the commercialisation arm of bulk metallic glass alloy IP that traces back to the Caltech research line.
US-centred filing with meaningful PCT and EPO coverage
The United States receives close to half of all tracked filings, with Europe and the PCT route each carrying well over a hundred filings — worth checking before assuming a US-only filing strategy is sufficient for freedom to operate.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| California Institute of Technology | 0 | — |
| Liquidmetal Technologies | 0 | — |
| NanoSteel Company | 0 | — |
| JOHNSON WILLIAM L | 0 | — |
| Crucible Intellectual Property, LLC | 0 | — |
| Desktop Metal, Inc. | 0 | — |
| B.F. Goodrich Company (USA) | 0 | — |
| Glassimetal Technology, Inc. | 0 | — |
Where to take this next
The trend and composition data point to specific next steps depending on whether you are scoping freedom to operate or looking for a filing gap.
Check processing-route claims before composition claims
With C22C alloy composition heavily filed, powder metallurgy, casting and additive manufacturing routes carry more room to differentiate a new filing.
Explore processing-route filings in EurekaConfirm whether the recent-year drop is real or lag
Zero latest-year filings across every major assignee is unusual enough to verify against the 18-month publication lag before concluding the field has gone cold.
Run a live filing-trend check in EurekaCommon questions on metallic glass mechanical property patents
In this dataset the two terms are used together in search, and most bulk metallic glass (BMG) filings are a subset of the broader metallic glass and amorphous alloy category. Bulk metallic glass specifically refers to amorphous alloys that can be formed in thicknesses of several millimetres or more without crystallising, which is what makes them usable in structural parts like the macroscale gears described in US10941847B2. Composition and processing claims for BMG sit inside the same IPC classes, chiefly C22C, as thinner or ribbon-form amorphous alloys.
The strongest filing cluster in this corpus traces back to California Institute of Technology and named inventor William L. Johnson, whose co-filings with Marios D. Demetriou form the single strongest co-assignee pair identified. Liquidmetal Technologies, working with inventor Atakan Peker, represents the commercial licensing side of that same research lineage. Beyond these anchors, filing volume spreads across a long tail of single- or few-filing entities rather than a second concentrated competitor.
Filings peaked at 70 in 2018 and dropped to 21 by the 2022 midpoint, with every major assignee showing zero filings in the most recent tracked year. Some of this apparent decline is real: composition space under C22C is heavily occupied, which raises the bar for new alloy claims. However, publication typically lags filing by about 18 months, so the most recent one to two years in any trend chart will understate actual filing activity until later records catch up.
The clearest opening is outside core alloy composition (C22C), which carries well over half the corpus, and inside adjacent processing and characterisation branches that are comparatively thin: fracture toughness testing methodology, amorphous alloy laminate interfaces, surface coating deposition onto BMG substrates, and machine-learning-assisted composition design. These branches show real but smaller filing volume, meaning they are active but not saturated the way composition claims are.
US10941847B2, assigned to California Institute of Technology, claims methods for fabricating bulk metallic glass gears above specific thickness and diameter thresholds, tying the composition selection to wear and fracture resistance targets. It does not block all metallic glass gear work outright; it constrains a specific fabrication method and size range, so designs outside those dimensional thresholds or using a different alloy-selection method may sit outside its claims. Any team designing BMG gears at macroscale should read the full claim set against their specific thickness, diameter and alloy-selection approach rather than assume blanket coverage.
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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.