Optical Frequency Comb Interface Engineering Patents: Who Leads 2026
- Twelve families total. this is a narrow, still-forming field where a single well-drafted application can shift the competitive map.
- Filing peaked in 2019 at nine records and has not returned to that level since, despite continued citation activity on the earliest lithium niobate work.
- One co-assignee pair anchors the cluster with four shared filings between two university research offices, while most other applicants filed alone.
What this landscape covers
Optical frequency comb interface engineering sits at the point where a comb source — usually a Kerr or electro-optic microring — has to hand its output to the rest of a system: a fiber, a waveguide, or a packaged module. The claims in this dataset cluster around fiber-chip coupling, comb output coupling interfaces, and package interface designs, rather than comb generation itself. That distinction matters for freedom-to-operate work: a device can generate a comb using well-established physics and still infringe on how that comb is coupled out.
The search covers TA/TACD hits against IPC classes for optical waveguide devices, electro-optic modulation, and optical elements, filtered to records that explicitly address the coupling or packaging interface rather than comb physics alone. Twelve patent families published between 2015 and the 2026 cut-off meet that bar, which makes this one of the smaller and more tractable landscapes to review claim-by-claim.
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Filing trend and technology composition
Publication counts understate the most recent one to two years because of the standard 18-month lag between filing and publication — treat the 2026 figure as a floor, not a ceiling.
Filings rose to a 2019 peak, then cooled
Annual filings ran at zero in 2017, climbed to nine records in the 2019 peak year, and sat at two by the 2022 midpoint. The 2026 figure of zero reflects the publication lag as much as any real slowdown, but the multi-year decline from 2019 is consistent across the visible window.
Concentrated in optical control, with lidar and laser overlap
G02F (optical control and modulation) covers 11 of the 12 records, confirming that this landscape is really about controlling and coupling the comb rather than generating it. G01S (radar, sonar and positioning) appears in five records — a signal that FM lidar is the leading downstream application pulling comb interface claims forward. H01S (lasers) and G02B (optical elements) round out the supporting classes.
Shares are the percentage of the 12 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Optical Frequency Comb Interface Engineering with Eureka
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Try EurekaThe citation leaders
Optical frequency comb generation in integrated lithium niobate devices
Kerr and electro-optic frequency comb generation in integrated lithium niobate devices is provided. In various embodiments, a microring resonator comprising lithium niobate is disposed on a thermal oxide substrate. The microring resonator has inner and outer edges. Electrodes are positioned along the inner and outer edges of the microring resonator, adapted to modulate the refractive index of the microring. A pump laser is optically coupled to the microring resonator, which emits an electro-optical frequency comb when the electrodes are driven at a frequency matching the free-spectral-range.This family is the most-cited record in the dataset and anchors a cluster of three related publications from the same underlying work.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US20210096444A1 | Optical frequency comb generation in integrated lithium niobate devices | 29 |
| 2 | US20220413354A1 | Optical frequency comb based parallel FM lidar | 14 |
| 3 | WO2019213137A1 | Optical frequency comb generation in integrated lithium niobate devices | 14 |
| 4 | US11537026B2 | Optical frequency comb generation in integrated lithium niobate devices | 11 |
| 5 | WO2021098975A1 | Optical frequency comb based parallel FM lidar | 9 |
| 6 | US9618392B2 | Spectroscopy assembly including optical ring resonators and at least one waveguide on a common substrate | 3 |
| 7 | US11809061B2 | Optical frequency comb generation in integrated lithium niobate devices | 1 |
Citation counts favour older filings simply because they have had longer to accumulate references — read them as a measure of influence on later filers, not a measure of current commercial relevance.
Publication numbers are shown where the record carries one (7 of 7 rows); clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Three patterns stand out once the data is pulled apart by year, IPC class and applicant.
A short filing burst, not a sustained wave
Nearly three-quarters of the visible filing activity landed in a single peak year. The drop-off by the 2022 midpoint suggests the initial wave of interface patents has largely been staked out, and later entrants are filing narrower, more specific claims rather than broad coupling architectures.
FM lidar is the clearest commercial driver
Five of twelve records carry a G01S classification alongside their optical control classing, tying comb interface work directly to frequency-modulated lidar systems. That overlap is a stronger signal of near-term commercial pull than the raw filing count alone.
Most applicants filed alone
Only two co-assignee pairs appear across the full dataset, and one accounts for four shared filings between two university offices. The near-absence of joint filing outside that pair points to a field still dominated by single-institution research programs rather than industry consortia.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to optical frequency comb interface engineering, with the prior art for and against each one.
Applicants and where the claim space is still open
The ranking is dominated by university research offices and a handful of named inventors, with no applicant showing filing activity in the most recent year — consistent with the broader slowdown after 2019.
University assignees hold the citation leaders
Harvard's research office and Stanford's junior university board sit behind the most-cited lithium niobate family in this dataset, and their four shared filings form the strongest co-assignee link found. Momentum has since gone flat across every named applicant, including EPFL and Honeywell.
Individual inventor filings persist alongside institutional ones
Kippenberg and Holzwarth appear as a co-assignee pair distinct from the university-held filings, indicating that some comb interface IP in this space is held by named inventors rather than assigned entirely to an institution — worth checking separately in any freedom-to-operate search.
Industry presence is thin
Honeywell is the only clearly corporate assignee in the current ranking, alongside a field otherwise held by academic offices and individuals. That leaves the interface engineering layer relatively open for corporate entrants willing to file now rather than license around the university cluster.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) | 0 | — |
| President and Fellows of Harvard College | 0 | — |
| The Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University | 0 | — |
| Honeywell International Inc. | 0 | — |
| KIPPENBERG TOBIAS | 0 | — |
| HOLZWARTH RONALD | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
This landscape is small enough to review record-by-record before committing to a filing or freedom-to-operate strategy.
Check the lithium niobate cluster for FTO risk
The most-cited family and its related publications cover microring-based electro-optic comb generation with integrated electrodes. Any new coupling or packaging design built around a lithium niobate microring should be checked against this cluster specifically.
Explore the citation networkWatch the lidar overlap for near-term filing activity
Five of twelve records already sit in the G01S lidar classification alongside optical control. New filings tying comb interface design to FM lidar systems are the most likely next wave in this field.
Track lidar-adjacent filingsCommon questions about this landscape
This dataset identifies 12 patent families published between 2015 and the 2026 cut-off that specifically address fiber-chip coupling, comb output coupling interfaces, or package interfaces for optical frequency comb systems. That is a small landscape compared to comb generation research generally, because most comb-related patents claim the resonator or laser physics rather than the coupling interface. Filing peaked in 2019 at nine records and has since slowed, though the most recent one to two years are understated due to publication lag.
The citation leaders in this dataset trace back to Harvard's research office, working on integrated lithium niobate microring devices, with Stanford's junior university board appearing as a strong co-assignee on related filings. EPFL and Honeywell also appear in the ranking, alongside named inventors Kippenberg and Holzwarth as a separate co-assignee pair. No applicant in the ranking shows filing activity in the most recent year, which is consistent with the broader post-2019 slowdown across the field.
Comb generation patents claim the physics of producing the frequency comb itself, typically a Kerr or electro-optic microring resonator design. Comb interface patents, which are what this landscape covers, claim how that generated comb is coupled out of the device — into a fiber, a waveguide, or a packaged module. A product can use well-established comb generation physics and still need a licence for its coupling or packaging approach, which is why these two claim types should be searched separately during freedom-to-operate work.
The data shows filings peaked at nine records in 2019 and fell to two by the 2022 midpoint, with no records yet visible in the final years of the window. Some of that apparent decline is a publication-lag artefact, since patents filed in 2024 or 2025 typically do not publish until roughly 18 months later. The remaining decline is consistent with an early wave of broad interface architecture claims being staked out first, followed by a pause before narrower follow-on filings appear.
The IPC composition shows heavy concentration in G02F optical control and modulation, with lighter coverage in G02B optical elements and G01J radiation measurement, suggesting under-claimed room in areas like athermal fiber-chip alignment, hermetic package interfaces, and lidar-specific comb output multiplexing. These are branches where the underlying application classes appear in the dataset but without a dense cluster of competing claims. A first filer in these sub-areas would face a comparatively open field rather than a crowded one.
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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.