Phase-Change Thermal Storage Patents: Leaders, Trends & White Space 2026
- Filing peaked in 2017 at 13 records and has not recovered since, sitting flat through the 2022 midpoint and down to 0 in the latest partial year.
- F28D and C09K carry 22 and 21 records respectively while semiconductor-adjacent H01L integration holds just 9 — the clearest sign of where claim space is still open.
- The two most-cited families sit in wick-structure heat pipes and melt-spun PCM pellets drawing 118 and 91 citations, marking them as the positions later filers had to design around.
Filing growth compares 2021 (3 records) with 2024 (2) — 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 67 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
A field that peaked early and has not reheated
Phase-change thermal storage sits at the intersection of materials science and packaging engineering: a latent heat storage material absorbs or releases heat as it changes phase, and the patent activity in this space splits fairly cleanly between claiming the material itself and claiming the hardware or container that holds it in place. That split shows up directly in the IPC data, where heat-exchange apparatus (F28D) and PCM materials (C09K) each carry roughly a third of the 67 records, with ceramics, separation processes and semiconductor integration trailing well behind.
Filing activity in this search peaked in 2017 and has been flat or declining since, with the most recent partial year showing no new filings — a pattern that is partly a publication-lag artefact and partly a genuine plateau. The receiving-office spread, led by the United States, EPO and WIPO PCT filings, points to a field that filed broadly across major jurisdictions during its active years rather than concentrating in a single market.
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Filing trend and technology composition
Sixty-seven published families sit inside this search, spanning 2015 through the partial 2026 cut-off. The trend and the IPC spread together show where claim density has actually built up, and where it has not.
Filings peaked in 2017 and have not recovered
Annual filings ran from 13 in 2017 down to a flat midpoint by 2022 and 0 in the most recent partial year. Publication lag of roughly 18 months means the last year or two will always look thinner than actual filing activity, but the multi-year plateau since the 2017 peak is a real signal, not an artefact of the cut-off.
Heat-exchange hardware and PCM materials dominate the IPC spread
F28D (heat-exchange apparatus, 22 records) and C09K (PCM materials, 21 records) carry the bulk of the filing volume. C04B (ceramics/cement, 12), B01D (separation processes, 10) and H01L (semiconductor devices, 9) trail well behind, with B01J and B65D at 7 apiece marking the thinnest claimed branches in the set.
Shares are the percentage of the 67 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Phase-Change Thermal Storage Miniaturization and Integration with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about phase-change thermal storage miniaturization and integration and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaRepresentative and most-cited patents
Latent Heat Storage Materials — GB201017444D0
Latent heat storage material formulations formed from a mixture comprising a binder, a phase change material and water, with the binder-to-water weight ratio held in a 3:1 to 1:5 range (1:1 to 1:5 preferred). Covers composite panel assemblies and encasements built from these materials, and the processes for their preparation, with binder options including Ordinary Portland cement, magnesia cement, pozzolan cement or magnesium chloride solution.Filed 2010-12-01, assignee Michael Trevor Berry.
View full filing in Eureka| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US6000438A | Phase change insulation for subsea flowlines | 178 |
| 2 | US6889755B2 | Heat pipe having a wick structure containing phase change materials | 118 |
| 3 | US6793856B2 | Melt spinable concentrate pellets having enhanced reversible thermal properties | 91 |
| 4 | US20040159422A1 | Heat pipe having a wick structure containing phase change materials | 59 |
| 5 | US20020105108A1 | Melt spinable concentrate pellets having enhanced reversible thermal properties | 41 |
| 6 | WO2011045574A1 | Latent heat storage materials | 27 |
| 7 | GB2474578A | Latent heat storage materials | 25 |
| 8 | GB2474544A | Composite panel assemblies | 25 |
| 9 | US20190110356A1 | Heat Capacitive Component Carrier and Method to Produce Said Component Carrier | 22 |
| 10 | US20050035482A1 | Melt spinable concentrate pellets having enhanced reversible thermal properties | 20 |
Ranked by citation count within the searched corpus; older filings are structurally favoured, so read this as influence rather than current commercial weight.
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Browse MCP servers →What the filing pattern actually indicates
Three findings stand out once the trend and the IPC spread are read together rather than separately.
No renewed filing surge since 2017
The peak year of 13 filings in 2017 has not been matched since, and the midpoint year of 2022 shows zero. Some of the most recent shortfall is publication lag, but the multi-year plateau before that is a genuine signal of slowing new filing.
Hardware and materials carry the bulk of claim density
Heat-exchange apparatus (F28D) and PCM materials (C09K) together account for the largest share of the 67 records, meaning new formulation or hardware claims in these classes face the densest prior art.
A handful of older families anchor the field
The most-cited records — subsea flowline insulation and wick-structure heat pipes — draw citation counts far above the rest of the corpus, marking them as the reference points that later filings had to work around.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to phase-change thermal storage miniaturization and integration, with the prior art for and against each one.
| Assignee | Co-assignee | Shared families |
|---|---|---|
| SCANLON JANET S | BERRY MICHAEL T | 4 |
| PULLUMBI PLUTON | MONEREAU CHRISTIAN | 3 |
| PULLUMBI PLUTON | GUERET VINCENT | 3 |
| MONEREAU CHRISTIAN | GUERET VINCENT | 3 |
| L'Air Liquide, Société Anonyme pour l'Étude et l'Exploitation des Procédés Georges Claude | PULLUMBI PLUTON | 1 |
| L'Air Liquide, Société Anonyme pour l'Étude et l'Exploitation des Procédés Georges Claude | MONEREAU CHRISTIAN | 1 |
| L'Air Liquide, Société Anonyme pour l'Étude et l'Exploitation des Procédés Georges Claude | GUERET VINCENT | 1 |
Seven co-assignee pairs appear in the dataset, the strongest being Scanlon Janet S with Berry Michael T (4 shared records) and two pairs involving Pullumbi Pluton (3 each) — a sign of small, stable filing teams rather than large corporate co-development.
Who filed, and where activity has gone quiet
Recent-year momentum across the tracked assignees is uniformly flat: every one of the leading names in this dataset shows zero filings in the latest year, consistent with the overall 2017-peak-then-plateau trend rather than any single company pulling back.
No assignee is currently active
Every tracked assignee in the recent-momentum data — spanning gas and materials companies as well as a university filer — shows zero filings in the most recent year, matching the broader plateau since the 2017 peak.
Small, stable filing teams rather than large alliances
The strongest co-assignee pairs — Scanlon Janet S with Berry Michael T, and two pairs involving Pullumbi Pluton — recur across multiple records, suggesting individual inventor-led teams filed serial continuations rather than broad corporate joint ventures.
Filing concentrated in the US, with broad PCT coverage
The United States leads as receiving office, followed closely by European and WIPO PCT filings and a solid United Kingdom and India presence, indicating filers sought protection across major thermal-storage manufacturing and demand markets rather than a single home jurisdiction.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| L'Air Liquide, Société Anonyme pour l'Étude et l'Exploitation des Procédés Georges Claude | 0 | — |
| AT&S Austria Technologie & Systemtechnik AG | 0 | — |
| Aspen Aerogels, Inc. | 0 | — |
| UNIV CERGY PONTOISE | 0 | — |
| Compass Minerals America Inc. | 0 | — |
| Autarus Technologies Ltd. | 0 | — |
| SCANLON JANET S | 0 | — |
| BERRY MICHAEL T | 0 | — |
Where to take this next
The dataset points to specific follow-up checks rather than a single conclusion.
Run a freedom-to-operate check on the cement-binder claim window
GB201017444D0's binder-to-water ratio range is narrow but specific; any cement-based PCM panel formulation should be checked against it before filing.
Check claim scope in EurekaScope the on-chip integration white space
H01L's 9 records against F28D's 22 suggests semiconductor-adjacent thermal storage structures are comparatively open; a targeted prior-art pull would confirm the margin.
Explore the IPC breakdown in EurekaTrack the highest-cited families for continuation activity
US6000438A and the wick-structure heat pipe family anchor citation depth in this corpus; watching their continuation chains flags where blocking claims might extend next.
Follow citation chains in EurekaCommon questions on phase-change thermal storage patents
Micro-encapsulated PCM refers to phase-change material sealed inside small individual shells rather than housed in a single bulk container, which allows the material to be mixed into panels, textiles, coatings or electronics packaging without leakage. It matters for filing because encapsulation method and shell material are patentable independently of the PCM chemistry itself, which is why B65D (containers/packaging) and C09K (materials) both carry separate filing activity in this dataset rather than one subsuming the other. A new entrant should check both classes before assuming a formulation-only search has cleared the field.
Influence in this dataset is best read through citation count rather than filing volume: the subsea flowline insulation patent US6000438A (178 citations) and the wick-structure heat pipe family behind US6889755B2 (118 citations) are the most-cited records, meaning later filers most often had to draft claims around them. High citation counts inside a fixed corpus skew toward older filings simply because they have had more time to accumulate citations, so treat this as a map of established reference points rather than a ranking of current market leaders.
No — H01L (semiconductor devices) carries only 9 of the 67 records in this search, making it the second-smallest technology cluster identified. That is a meaningfully lower filing density than the F28D heat-exchange hardware cluster (22 records) or the C09K materials cluster (21 records), which suggests claim space for compact, chip-adjacent thermal storage structures remains genuinely open rather than merely under-searched. Filers should still check adjacent B65D packaging and C04B ceramics claims, since integration formats sometimes get claimed from those angles instead.
Filings peaked at 13 in 2017 and the trend has been flat or declining since, reaching 0 by the most recent partial year in this dataset. Part of that apparent decline is a data artefact: publication typically lags actual filing by around 18 months, so the final one or two years in any patent trend will always understate real activity. Even accounting for that lag, though, the multi-year plateau from 2017 onward through the 2022 midpoint indicates the field has not seen a renewed filing surge, which is different from saying the technology has stopped developing.
GB201017444D0 claims latent heat storage formulations made from a binder, a phase change material and water, with the binder-to-water weight ratio constrained to a 3:1 to 1:5 range and the binder limited to specific cement or magnesium chloride chemistries. Anyone formulating a similar cement-bound PCM composite panel or encasement within that ratio band and binder list is working inside the claimed territory, including the manufacturing process for those assemblies. Formulations using non-cementitious binders, ratios outside the stated range, or entirely different integration formats such as micro-encapsulated polymer shells sit outside this particular claim's scope.
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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.