Mine Planning Patents: Who Leads, Where the Gaps Are 2026
Mine Planning and Scheduling Patents: Concentration at the Top, Room at the Edges
77.0% of all 296 records sit with just five assignees, and 90.2% with ten — this is a field where a handful of players hold most of the claim space. Annual filings ran from 5 in 2017 to a peak of 47 in 2024, with the 2021-to-2024 span alone showing +213% growth. 2025 and 2026 read lower, but that reflects publication lag of roughly 18 months rather than a real slowdown — those years are still filling in.
- 1FREEPORT MCMORAN INC113
- 2BHP BILLITON INNOVATION PTY LTD52
- 32341451 ONTARIO23
- 4TECHNOLOGICAL RESOURCES PTY LTD21
- 5COMMONWEALTH SCI & IND RES ORG19
See the full mine planning and scheduling analysis in Eureka
- The complete ranking, not just the top five
- Every IPC branch with its share of the corpus
- The most-cited records, and where claim space is still thin
Common questions about mine planning and scheduling patents
Who holds the most patents in mine planning and scheduling?
One assignee leads the ranked field by a wide margin, holding 113 of the 296 records in scope — close to a third of the entire dataset. The gap to the rest of the field is steep: fifth place holds 19 records and tenth place holds 4, so the leader’s position is not closely contested by any single competitor. The ranked list covers 34 companies in total, and it is the complete list the dataset returns rather than a top-50 or top-100 cut.
Is mine planning and scheduling patent activity growing?
Yes, filings grew 213% from 15 in 2021 to a peak of 47 in 2024, which is the strongest three-year run in the dataset. Figures for 2025 and 2026 appear lower, but that reflects publication lag of roughly 18 months rather than a genuine slowdown, since recent filings have not all published yet. 2024 is the most recent year that can be treated as a complete, reliable data point.
What technology areas dominate mine planning patent filings?
Business, commerce and administrative data processing (IPC class G06Q) is the largest single category, appearing in 46.3% of the 296 records, ahead of core mining and quarrying claims under E21C at 34.5% and metal extraction and refining under C22B at 28.7%. Because a single record can carry multiple IPC classes, these percentages overlap rather than summing to 100%. The pattern shows software and data-processing layers — scheduling engines, image processing, digital data handling — increasingly wrapped around traditional mining operations claims.
Disclaimer. This analysis is based on Patsnap Eureka data drawn from a limited snapshot of global patent records and is provided for general information and reference only. Patent data carries inherent limitations — recent filings are under-counted because of publication lag, counts may be on a record or family basis, classification and applicant-name data may contain errors or duplicates, and the underlying search query defines the scope shown — so the analysis may be incomplete or inaccurate and may not reflect the full technology landscape.
Nothing here is an exhaustive prior-art, novelty, freedom-to-operate or validity search, nor does it constitute legal, financial or professional advice, and it should not be relied upon as such. Verify independently and review with qualified patent and legal professionals before acting on it.
Method: Filing trend and technology composition. Derived from a Patsnap search on Mine Planning and Scheduling covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish. Every share divides by all records in scope. Data: Patsnap Eureka. See the full landscape report.