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Run your analysis now →https://www.patsnap.com/resources/blog/rd-blog/nondestructive-testing-eddy-current-array-patent-landscape-patent-landscape/ · Patsnap · data cut-off 2026-08-31 · downloaded from the live page
Patent Landscape · Nondestructive TestingEddy Current Array Patents: Where Filing Concentrates and Where It Doesn't
A data-backed view of eddy current array patent activity: filing trends, leading assignees, technology composition and the most-cited inspection patents shaping the field through 2026.
370
Published Records
45%
Top-5 Share of All Records
+93%
Filing Growth 2021→2024
CN
Leading Jurisdiction
Filing growth = 2021 (15 records) → 2024 (29); 2024 is the last year we treat as complete. Top-5 share = the 5 largest assignees ÷ all 370 records in scope (CR5), not the ranked leaders only.
Published byPatsnap Research··6 min readSourced from Patsnap Eureka
Field Overview
What the eddy current array patent record shows
Eddy current array probes replace single-coil scanning with a fixed or phased grid of sensor elements, cutting inspection time on turbine blades, pressure vessels, pipeline welds and additive-manufacturing parts. The 370 records in scope span 2015 through the partial 2026 filing year, and the earliest heavily-cited patents in the set — filed decades before the search window opens — still define how later applicants draft array-probe claims. Publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so the last one to two years of the trend understate real filing activity rather than showing a genuine slowdown.
Filing activity is not evenly spread. A handful of assignees account for close to half of all records, IPC classification clusters overwhelmingly in material analysis and testing, and receiving-office activity is led by China and the United States with Europe, Canada, the UK and WIPO taking meaningfully smaller shares. Each of those patterns matters differently to a filing strategy than to a freedom-to-operate review.
Filing activity and technology composition, 2015–2026
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee ranking and totals. Derived from a Patsnap search on Nondestructive Testing: Eddy Current Array Patent Landscape covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-08-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
Filing & Classification Data
Filing trend and technology composition
The chart pairs annual filing counts with the IPC subclasses those filings are classified under, using the full 370-record set as the denominator throughout.
Filing trend, 2017–2026
Filings rose from 13 in 2017 to a peak of 38 in 2022, then held above earlier levels through 2024 (29 records) before the 2025-2026 count drops off — a drop attributable to publication lag rather than a real pullback in filing.
Publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so 2025 onwards are still filling in. Growth rates on this page therefore end at 2024; running them to the last bar would understate the field.
IPC subclass distribution
G01N (material analysis and testing) covers 89.2% of the 370 records, confirming eddy current array work is classified overwhelmingly as a testing method rather than as, say, digital signal processing (G06F, 2.4%) or additive manufacturing (B33Y, 2.4%), even though both appear as secondary classes on a meaningful number of filings.
Shares are the percentage of the 370 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 Nondestructive Testing: Eddy Current Array Patent Landscape covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-08-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.
Go deeper on Nondestructive Testing: Eddy Current Array Patent Landscape with Eureka
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Try EurekaFoundational Filings
The patents the field cites back to
Representative Filing
US20090091318A1 — Phased scan eddy current array probe and phased scanning method
OLYMPUS NDT
A phased scanning method and phased scan eddy current array probe suitable for in-situ eddy current inspection of a structure without mechanical scanning. Overlapping subsets of the sensor elements within the array probe are dynamically connected in series and sequentially scanned to simulate the mechanical motion of a conventional array probe along a test surface, using a reference scan stored in the probe's own memory to balance subsequent measurement data.Filed by Olympus NDT; the assignee lineage for this filing later passed through Evident, which appears separately in the current assignee ranking.
Most-cited eddy current array patents in scope
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US5315234A | Eddy current device for inspecting a component having a flexible support with a plural sensor array | 123 |
| 2 | US5442286A | Eddy current array inspection device | 115 |
| 3 | US20160349215A1 | Non-destructive evaluation of additive manufacturing components using an eddy current array system and method | 66 |
| 4 | EP0577244A2 | A device for inspecting a component | 54 |
| 5 | US20230003687A1 | Systems, methods and apparatus for in-service tank inspections | 52 |
| 6 | US5903147A | Eddy current array inspection device for shaped holes | 48 |
| 7 | US6812697B2 | Molded eddy current array probe | 45 |
| 8 | US6545467B1 | Contoured surface eddy current inspection system | 43 |
| 9 | CN103487502A | 检测复杂导电结构表面缺陷的涡流阵列探头及系统 | 39 |
| 10 | US20090115410A1 | Eddy current probe and methods of assembling the same | 38 |
Citation counts inside this corpus skew toward older filings simply because they have had longer to accumulate citations — treat them as a signal of influence on later drafting, not a ranking of present-day importance.
Patent titles are shown in the language they were filed in, not translated, so that each record stays verifiable against the original filing — a translated title will not match in Eureka or in any national register. 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 Nondestructive Testing: Eddy Current Array Patent Landscape covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-08-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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What the concentration and citation data imply
Three patterns recur across the assignee, classification and citation data — each points to a different kind of filing decision.
Concentration
45.1% of 370
held by the top five assignees
The top of the field is dense, not diffuse
The leading assignee alone accounts for 81 records, and the top five combined hold 167 of the 370 records in scope. A single-digit group of applicants has been filing continuation and related applications around core array-probe and phased-scanning claims for years, which raises the bar for a new entrant trying to claim the same probe-architecture space.
Based on the 100-company assignee ranking returned for this search.
Growth
+93%, 2021→2024
filings across the last complete three-year window
Activity accelerated well before the data cut-off
Filings climbed from 15 in 2021 to 29 in 2024, with 2022 marking the peak year at 38. That trajectory reflects real demand for array-based inspection in sectors like pressure-vessel and additive-manufacturing QA, not filing-window noise, since it holds across a three-year span that the evidence treats as complete.
2025 and 2026 counts are excluded from this comparison due to publication lag.
Classification
89.2% in G01N
of 370 records carry a G01N classification
Claim language sits almost entirely inside one subclass
G01M, G01B, G01R, B33Y, G06F, F17C and F01D each appear on a small minority of records, usually as a secondary class alongside G01N. That secondary presence is where application-specific claims — turbine blades (F01D), pressure vessels (F17C), additive parts (B33Y) — tend to sit, and it is thinner ground than the core probe-and-signal-processing claims in G01N.
Class shares sum to more than 100% because a single record can carry multiple IPC codes.
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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 nondestructive testing: eddy current array patent landscape, with the prior art for and against each one.
Where filers co-assign
| Assignee | Co-assignee | Shared families |
|---|---|---|
| Research Institute of Nuclear Power Operation | China Nuclear Power Wuhan Operation Technology Co., Ltd. | 5 |
| General Electric Company | WANG CHANGTING | 4 |
| General Electric Company | SUH UI | 4 |
| General Electric Company | SANGHAMITHRA KORUKONDA | 4 |
| General Electric Company | SANDEEP DEWANGAN | 4 |
| General Electric Company | MCKNIGHT WILLIAM STEWART | 4 |
| General Electric Company | GAMBRELL GIGI | 4 |
| GLOBAL INSPECTIONS NDT INC | GLOBAL PHYSICAL ASSET MANAGEMENT INC | 3 |
Ten co-assignee pairings appear in the data; the strongest links a nuclear-operations research institute with an affiliated nuclear power operating company, and separately connect a large industrial assignee with two individual named inventors — patterns consistent with in-house R&D teams filing jointly with a parent or partner entity rather than open cross-licensing.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Co-assignee relationships and derived observations. Derived from a Patsnap search on Nondestructive Testing: Eddy Current Array Patent Landscape covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-08-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
Next Steps
Turning this landscape into a filing or FTO decision
The counts and rankings on this page describe the field as it stands; deciding where to file or challenge requires drilling into specific claims.
Map the white space in secondary classes
B33Y and F17C carry a small share of records but sit on specific application domains — additive-manufacturing inspection and pressure-vessel testing — that are thinner than the core G01N claim space. A narrower claim built around one of those use cases may clear prior art that a general array-probe claim cannot.
Explore under-claimed branches in EurekaTrack the leading assignee's continuation filings
With 81 of 370 records, the top assignee's filing pattern is the single most useful proxy for where core claim space is still moving. Watching its continuation and divisional filings shows which parts of the probe architecture are still being actively defended.
Set up assignee monitoring in EurekaRun a claim-level check against the most-cited patents
The five most-cited records anchor how phased-scan and array-probe claims are drafted industry-wide. A new filing or product should be checked against their claim scope before assuming an adjacent design is clear.
Run a claim comparison in EurekaSource: Patsnap Eureka. Forward-looking reading of the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Nondestructive Testing: Eddy Current Array Patent Landscape covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-08-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
Frequently Asked
Questions practitioners ask about this field
One assignee leads the field with 81 of the 370 records in scope, and the top five assignees combined hold 45.1% of all records. That concentration means a small group of companies has been filing continuations and related applications around core array-probe and phased-scanning architecture for years. A new entrant should expect dense prior art around basic multi-element probe claims and look instead at application-specific niches where filing is thinner.
Filings rose from 15 in 2021 to 29 in 2024, a 93% increase across that three-year window, with the single busiest year so far being 2022 at 38 filings. The apparent drop in 2025 and 2026 is not a real slowdown; publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so recent years are still being backfilled in the data. Judged on the last complete years, activity has been accelerating rather than cooling.
The overwhelming majority, 89.2% of the 370 records, carry a G01N classification for material analysis and testing, which is where core probe and signal-processing claims sit. Smaller shares touch G01M (testing machines and structures), G01B (dimensional measurement), G01R (electric and magnetic measurement), and application-specific areas like B33Y (additive manufacturing) and F17C (pressure vessels). Because a single record can carry more than one class, these figures add up to more than 100% of the record total.
The most-cited record in scope is US5315234A, an eddy current device using a flexible support with a plural sensor array, cited 123 times, followed closely by US5442286A on eddy current array inspection devices at 115 citations. Both predate the current search window by years, which is typical: citation counts inside a searched corpus favour older filings simply because they have had more time to accumulate citations. They are best read as evidence of influence on later claim drafting, not as a signal of current commercial importance.
China leads receiving-office activity with 110 filings, followed by the United States at 91, the European Patent Office at 52, WIPO/PCT filings at 27, Canada at 26 and the United Kingdom at 17. That spread suggests applicants are pursuing protection across the major manufacturing and inspection markets rather than concentrating on a single jurisdiction, though China and the US together account for the bulk of activity.
Answers are grounded in the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Nondestructive Testing: Eddy Current Array Patent Landscape covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-08-31. 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.