Perovskite Solar Cell Patents: Who Leads, Where Filing Stalled 2026
- Filing peaked in 2021 at 272 families and has since flattened, with 2022 sitting at 255 — the growth phase looks to be behind this technology, not ahead of it.
- China dominates the filing map with 1,064 records at its receiving office, more than six times the United States total of 157, concentrating both risk and opportunity there.
- Co-assignee filing is rare — only 10 pairs across 1,600 families, and the strongest links tie Chinese state energy groups and Korean university tech-transfer offices to a single partner each, not to open networks.
Filing growth compares 2021 (272 records) with 2024 (32) — 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 1,600 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this landscape covers
This dataset tracks 1,600 patent families filed against perovskite solar cell claims combined with hole transport layer, passivation, tandem stack, operational stability or power conversion efficiency language, restricted to semiconductor and photovoltaic IPC classes. Filing activity opens in 2017 at 106 families, climbs to a peak of 272 in 2021, and by the 2022 midpoint has already eased to 255 — the trend line bends down rather than up heading into the most recent, still-partial year.
Publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so any apparent drop-off in the final one or two years understates real filing activity rather than reflecting an actual halt. The pattern that matters here is the shape of the curve, not the raw endpoint.
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 1,600-family corpus: how filing has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses carry the claim weight.
A peak in 2021, then a plateau
Annual filings rose from 106 in 2017 to a high of 272 in 2021, then eased to 255 by 2022 — a flat-to-declining trajectory into the most recent years, which are still understated by publication lag.
Concentrated in semiconductor devices, spilling into organics and capacitors
H01L (semiconductor devices) covers 1,565 of 1,600 records, essentially the entire set. H10K (organic semiconductors, 389) and H01G (capacitors, 124) are the largest adjacent classes, with nanotechnology, heterocyclic chemistry and organometallic classes each in the 30-60 range — evidence that chemistry-side claims are a minority activity layered onto a device-dominated field.
Shares are the percentage of the 1,600 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Perovskite Solar Cell Technology with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about perovskite solar cell technology and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe most-cited records in this corpus
US11810730B1 — Hybrid perovskite solar cell with organoselenium-based polymer hole transport layer
The hybrid perovskite solar cell with an organoselenium-based polymer hole transport layer includes an optically transparent first electrode layer, an electron transport layer, and a perovskite layer. The electron transport layer is sandwiched between the optically transparent first electrode layer and the perovskite layer. The hybrid perovskite solar cell further includes a hole transport layer and a second electrode layer. The perovskite layer is sandwiched between the electron transport layer and the hole transport layer, and the hole transport layer is sandwiched between the perovskite layer and the second electrode layer.Filed by King Faisal University, published 2023-11-07 — illustrates the layer-stack claim style typical of hole-transport-layer filings in this corpus.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | CN103746078A | 一种钙钛矿太阳能电池及其制备方法 | 78 |
| 2 | US20160079552A1 | Perovskite solar cell | 72 |
| 3 | CN105070834A | 一种基于掺杂型NiO空穴传输层的钙钛矿太阳能电池及其制备方法 | 63 |
| 4 | US20150287852A1 | Crystal Control and Stability for High-Performance Perovskite Solar Cell | 63 |
| 5 | US20150279573A1 | Perovskite solar cell | 62 |
| 6 | US20150295194A1 | Lead-free solid-state organic-inorganic halide perovskite photovoltaic cells | 57 |
| 7 | US20180019358A1 | Tandem solar cell, tandem solar cell module comprising the same, and method for manufacturing thereof | 55 |
| 8 | KR1020150124413A | Perovskite solar cell and preparing method of the same | 54 |
| 9 | CN104124295A | 一种平面异质结钙钛矿太阳能电池及其制备方法 | 54 |
| 10 | JP2018093168A | Tandem solar cell and method for manufacturing the same | 49 |
Citation counts are drawn from a searched corpus and skew toward older filings; treat them as a signal of influence on later work, not of current commercial relevance.
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.
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Three read-outs from the family counts, IPC spread and citation data that matter for a filing or freedom-to-operate decision.
The growth phase has already passed
Filings rose steadily from 106 in 2017 to a 2021 peak of 272, then fell to 255 by 2022. That is a plateau at best, not an accelerating field — new entrants are filing into ground that is already dense rather than into open territory.
China is the primary filing venue by a wide margin
China's receiving office accounts for 1,064 of the tracked filings, well ahead of the United States (157), EPO (107), South Korea (89), WIPO (80) and India (50). Freedom-to-operate analysis that skips Chinese filings misses most of the corpus.
Device claims dominate; chemistry claims are secondary
H01L semiconductor-device claims appear in 1,565 of 1,600 records, effectively universal. Organic-semiconductor (H10K, 389) and capacitor (H01G, 124) classifications trail well behind, and material-chemistry classes (C07D, C07F, C07C, C08G) each sit at 30-58 — the layer-stack and device architecture is where claim density lives.
Filing is overwhelmingly solo, not collaborative
Only 10 co-assignee pairs exist across the entire corpus. The strongest is a Chinese state energy research institute paired with its affiliated new-energy company (22 shared filings); the next strongest links a Korean multidisciplinary energy research group to a university tech-transfer office (19). These are bilateral, not networked, relationships.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to perovskite solar cell technology, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who holds the ground — and where the gaps sit
Recent-year momentum has cooled across the assignees tracked here, which changes how a competitive read of this field should be framed.
Momentum has stalled across the named leaders
Every assignee tracked for recent-year momentum — spanning Chinese universities, a Korean multidisciplinary energy research group, a Korean university tech-transfer office and a major battery manufacturer — shows zero filings in the latest year. Given the 18-month publication lag, this reflects a slowdown in disclosed activity from these specific filers rather than an industry-wide stop.
The tightest partnership is a state-affiliated energy pairing
The strongest co-assignee link in the corpus pairs a Chinese state clean-energy research institute with its affiliated new-energy company at 22 shared filings — a captive, single-partner relationship rather than an open consortium.
Korean university-industry ties run through tech-transfer offices
The second-strongest pairing connects a Korean multidisciplinary energy research group to a university's industry-academic cooperation foundation, at 19 shared filings, with a third pairing to a US university at 8 — a pattern of academic IP being routed through formal transfer offices rather than filed directly by faculty.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| LG Electronics Inc. | 0 | — |
| University of Electronic Science and Technology of China | 0 | — |
| Multidimensional Energy Systems Research Group | 0 | — |
| Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Ltd. (CATL) | 0 | — |
| Sungkyunkwan University Research & Business Foundation | 0 | — |
| Nankai University | 0 | — |
| China Huaneng Group Clean Energy Technology Research Institute Co., Ltd. | 0 | — |
| Xidian University | 0 | — |
Next steps for a deeper technical or freedom-to-operate review
The trends above point to where to look next, not to a finished answer.
Run a freedom-to-operate check on hole transport layer claims
With H01L claims present in nearly every record and hole-transport-layer language embedded in the search itself, a layer-stack FTO check is the highest-value next step before committing to a specific device architecture.
Explore hole transport layer claims in EurekaTrack the assignees whose filing has gone quiet
Several previously active Chinese and Korean assignees show zero filings in the latest tracked year. Confirming whether that reflects publication lag or an actual pivot changes how much weight to put on their existing claim positions.
Monitor assignee activity in EurekaSearch the under-claimed chemistry adjacencies
Organometallic, heterocyclic and condensation-polymer classifications each sit far below the semiconductor-device core. A targeted search there may surface open claim space before a competitor files it.
Search adjacent IPC classes in EurekaCommon questions about perovskite solar cell patents
The corpus shows filing concentrated among a mix of Chinese universities and state-linked energy research groups, Korean university tech-transfer foundations, and a handful of global electronics and battery manufacturers. No single assignee dominates outright; the field looks more like a dense cluster of active filers than a single clear leader. Checking the current assignee ranking directly is more reliable than relying on any single year's snapshot, since recent-year momentum has cooled across nearly all of the largest filers.
Filing rose from 106 families in 2017 to a peak of 272 in 2021, then eased to 255 by 2022, and the years after that show even lower counts. Part of that apparent decline is a publication-lag artifact — patents filed in 2024 or 2025 typically don't publish for about 18 months, so the most recent years in any trend chart are always undercounted. That said, the plateau starting in 2021-2022 is a real signal that the technology's most heavily claimed layer-stack architectures were already well covered by that point.
China's receiving office accounts for 1,064 of the 1,600 tracked filings, far ahead of the United States at 157, the European Patent Office at 107, South Korea at 89, WIPO/PCT filings at 80, and India at 50. A freedom-to-operate or competitive review that only checks US and European filings will miss the majority of the disclosed art in this field. Chinese-language patent search and translation is effectively mandatory for a complete picture here.
US11810730B1, assigned to King Faisal University and published in November 2023, claims a hybrid perovskite solar cell built around an organoselenium-based polymer hole transport layer sandwiched between the perovskite layer and a second electrode, with an electron transport layer on the opposite side. It is a specific material-and-stack combination, not a claim over hole transport layers generally, so it constrains organoselenium-polymer HTL formulations specifically rather than the broader hole-transport-layer category. Anyone working with alternative HTL chemistries — doped metal oxides, other conductive polymers, or inorganic hole conductors — would need a separate check against those specific claim families rather than treating this patent as a blanket barrier.
Relative to the dense hole-transport-layer and passivation claim clusters that dominate the H01L core, several adjacent branches show thinner filing: organoselenium-based and other non-standard hole transport polymers, NiO-doped hole transport layer variants, tandem-stack interconnect passivation, and nanotechnology-enabled encapsulation methods under B82Y. These lower-density areas are worth a dedicated prior-art search before filing, since thinner coverage today does not guarantee it stays open, especially given how quickly this field's filing concentrated in its peak years.
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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.