Microencapsulated Pesticide Patents: Top Companies & Trends 2026
- 49.0% concentration. The top 5 of 314 records in scope, with the leader alone holding 41 records — a field where a handful of legacy agrochemical filers still set the terms.
- Filings down 50% since 2021. From 8 filings in 2021 to 4 in 2024, the last year the data can treat as complete, after peaking at 14 in 2022.
- Claims cluster in one class. 91.1% of records sit in A01N (biocides), leaving classes like B05B (spraying/atomising) and C08G (condensation polymers) touched by only a handful of filings each.
Filing growth compares 2021 (8 records) with 2024 (4) — 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 314 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this landscape covers
Microencapsulation lets a pesticide active sit inside a polymer or resin wall that controls when and how fast it releases — slowing volatility loss, shielding the active from photodegradation, and stretching the effective window of a single application. This landscape draws on 314 published records filed or published between 2015 and mid-2026 that describe microencapsulated pesticide formulations, drawing on claim language around interfacial polymerization, wall material chemistry, release-rate control and capsule sizing.
Because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, the 2025 and 2026 figures in any trend are undercounts, not a real drop-off — the last year with a complete filing picture is 2024.
Let an AI agent run this analysis on your own technology
Pick a task. Every answer cites the patents behind it.
Filing trends and technology composition
Two views of the same 314 records: how filing activity has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses carry the claim volume.
Filing activity, 2017–2026
Filings ran from 8 in 2017 to a peak of 14 in 2022, then declined to 4 by 2024 — a -50% move from the 2021 level of 8. 2025 and 2026 figures are still filling in under the publication lag and should not be read as a continued slide.
Technology composition by IPC subclass
A01N (biocides/agrochemicals) covers 91.1% of the 314 records, with A01P (pesticide activity) a distant second at 36.3%. B01J (chemical/physical processes) appears in 18.8% of records; everything below that — A61K, C05F, C08G, A01G, B05B — sits under 5% each, since records can and do carry more than one class.
Shares are the percentage of the 314 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Microencapsulated Pesticide Formulations with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about microencapsulated pesticide formulations and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe most-cited prior art
US5576008A — Preparation of pesticide microcapsule
This invention relates to a novel method for preparing pesticide microcapsules in which the release rate and the release period of the pesticide are controlled. A process has been discovered for encapsulating a trace amount of pesticide with a urea-formaldehyde resin, mechanically stirring the resin in the presence of vegetable oil and the pesticide and reacting the mixture under suitable conditions to form a desired pesticide microcapsule.Filed by Industrial Technology Research Institute, granted 1996 — a foundational urea-formaldehyde wall-material approach that later filings still have to design around or improve on.
View full filing| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US4936901A | Formulations of water-dispersible granules and process for preparation thereof | 261 |
| 2 | US4280833A | Encapsulation by interfacial polycondensation, and aqueous herbicidal composition containing microcapsules pr… | 156 |
| 3 | US5583090A | Herbicidal microencapsulated clomazone compositions with reduced vapor transfer | 155 |
| 4 | US4417916A | Encapsulation by interfacial polycondensation | 132 |
| 5 | US5354742A | Water-dispersible granules and process for the preparation thereof | 98 |
| 6 | US5783520A | Microencapsulated herbicidal compositions comprising clomazone and edible oils | 87 |
| 7 | US5705174A | Process for the preparation of microcapsule compositions | 85 |
| 8 | EP0252897A2 | Formulations of water-dispersible granules and process for preparation thereof | 75 |
| 9 | US20090181254A1 | Multi-capsule system and its use for encapsulating active agents | 65 |
| 10 | US5229122A | Pesticidal compositions | 65 |
Citation counts favour older filings that have had more time to be cited — read them as markers of influence on later claim drafting, not of what is commercially current.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
Put your own technology through the same analysis
Eureka on the web
When you want the answer in the next five minutes.
The agent works the prompt against patents and technical literature, citing every source.
Run your analysis now →MCP server & REST API
When it has to run inside your own pipeline.
Patent search, landscape analysis and assignee resolution as MCP tools. Drop them into any agent framework, or call REST directly.
Browse MCP servers →What the numbers mean for a filing decision
Read together, concentration, technology mix and citation depth point to where new claims face the densest prior art and where they don't.
A small group still sets the baseline
The leading assignee alone accounts for 41 records, and the top 5 combined hold 49.0% of all 314 records in scope. That means roughly half the documented claim space traces to a handful of legacy agrochemical filers, with a long tail of single- or few-filing entrants behind them.
Claims are densest where the pesticide activity itself is described
A01N dominates because most filings are framed around the biocide composition rather than the encapsulation mechanics alone. Classes tied to spraying equipment (B05B) or condensation-polymer chemistry (C08G) appear in only a handful of records each, which is a thinner base to build a freedom-to-operate view on.
Activity has cooled from its 2022 peak
Filings peaked at 14 in 2022 before falling to 4 by 2024, a decline the dataset can state with confidence because 2024 is the last year unaffected by publication lag. Whether that reflects consolidation among established formulators or a pause ahead of new wall-material chemistries is not something the citation data alone answers.
The oldest granted patents still anchor the field
The most-cited records date to the 1980s and 1990s and cover interfacial polycondensation and water-dispersible granule processes — foundational techniques that later filings on release-rate control and photodegradation protection still build on or design around.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to microencapsulated pesticide formulations, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who holds the claim space, and where the gate stands open
The ranked leaders are dominated by legacy crop-chemical majors, but recent-year filing activity from those same names has gone quiet — a signal worth checking before assuming the incumbents still control the frontier.
One filer holds the largest single share
The top-ranked assignee holds 41 of the 314 records in scope, well ahead of the fifth-place holder at 18 and the tenth-place holder at 7 — a steep drop-off that marks a genuine leader rather than a crowded top tier.
The historic leaders show no filings in the latest year
Each of the top-ranked legacy agrochemical assignees shows zero filings in the most recent year of the dataset. Combined with the broader -50% filing decline from 2021 to 2024, this suggests the incumbents that built the current claim density are not the ones actively adding to it right now.
Co-filing is limited and mostly internal
Only 10 co-assignee pairs appear across the dataset, and the strongest links sit between a single major assignee and its own named inventors or corporate affiliates rather than between independent companies. Cross-company joint filing is not a visible pattern here.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Monsanto Co (US) | 0 | — |
| Monsanto Technology LLC | 0 | — |
| Dow AgroSciences LLC | 0 | — |
| Syngenta Limited | 0 | — |
| Sumitomo Chemical Co., Ltd. | 0 | — |
| American Cyanamid Company | 0 | — |
| Endura S.p.A. | 0 | — |
| FMC Corporation (US) | 0 | — |
Where to take this next
The landscape points to where claim density is real and where it is assumed. Turning that into a filing or freedom-to-operate decision means going deeper on specific claims.
Map claims against the under-claimed branches
The gate chips above flag sub-areas with thin IPC coverage relative to the field's overall concentration. Confirming whether that thinness is real white space or simply unindexed prior art needs a claim-by-claim read, not just a class count.
Explore in EurekaCheck design-around options on the highest-citation patents
The most-cited records anchor wall-material and release-control approaches that later filings had to work around. Any new formulation claim should be checked against these before drafting.
Run a claim comparison in EurekaWatch for new entrants replacing quiet incumbents
The leading legacy assignees show no filings in the latest year. If commercial activity in microencapsulated pesticides is continuing, new claims are likely coming from a different set of filers worth tracking directly.
Set up assignee tracking in EurekaCommon questions on this landscape
One assignee leads the ranked field with 41 of the 314 records in scope, and the top 5 assignees combined hold 49.0% of all records. The gap to the tenth-ranked assignee, which holds 7 records, is steep, so this is a field with a clear leader rather than an even spread among many similarly sized filers. That said, the leading legacy names show no filings in the most recent year, which is worth checking before assuming they remain the active frontier.
Filings peaked at 14 in 2022 and fell to 4 by 2024, a -50% move from the 2021 level of 8 filings. 2024 is the most recent year the dataset can treat as complete; 2025 and 2026 figures are still artificially low because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months. So the honest read is a real decline through the most recent complete year, not a continuing freefall that the newest data points would seem to suggest.
The overwhelming majority, 91.1% of the 314 records, sit in IPC class A01N covering biocides and general agrochemicals, with 36.3% also touching A01P for pesticide activity specifically. Process and catalysis class B01J appears in 18.8% of records, reflecting the encapsulation chemistry itself. Smaller classes — medicinal preparations, fertilisers, spraying equipment, horticulture — each appear in under 5% of records, marking them as comparatively under-claimed relative to the core biocide composition claims.
US5576008A describes a method for preparing pesticide microcapsules using a urea-formaldehyde resin wall, mechanically stirred with vegetable oil and the pesticide active to control release rate and release period. It is a specific process claim tied to that resin chemistry and mixing method, not a claim over microencapsulated pesticides generally. A new formulation using a different wall material, a different crosslinking chemistry, or a materially different mixing process would not automatically fall within its claims, though any urea-formaldehyde-based approach should be checked against it directly.
The clearest under-claimed branches by IPC volume are spray-equipment-integrated delivery (B05B), condensation-polymer wall chemistries outside the urea-formaldehyde lineage (C08G), and fertiliser-coupled or horticulture-specific release formulations (C05F, A01G), each appearing in only a handful of the 314 records. These low counts do not guarantee the space is legally open — they indicate where the indexed claim density is thin enough to warrant a closer freedom-to-operate check rather than an assumption of prior art coverage.
Research Microencapsulated Pesticide Formulations in depth with Eureka
Go past this page: query the whole microencapsulated pesticide formulations corpus yourself, in your own scope.
Every answer comes back with patent numbers you can open.
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.