Polymer Flooding Patents: Top Companies & Filing Trends 2026
- 37.8% of all 471 records sit with just five assignees, so the field concentrates hard at the top rather than spreading evenly across the industry.
- Filings grew +325% from 2021 to 2024 (4 to 17 records), the clearest recent-year signal before publication lag makes 2025-2026 look artificially quiet.
- C09K materials claims cover 64.3% of records while data-processing and testing classes (G06F, G01N) stay under 5%, pointing to where digital and diagnostic claims remain thin.
Filing growth compares 2021 (4 records) with 2024 (17) — 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 471 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What the polymer flooding patent record actually shows
Polymer flooding patents cluster around two problems: getting a viscosifying polymer to survive mechanical shear and salinity long enough to control mobility ratio, and proving how much of the reservoir pore volume that polymer can actually reach. The search set spans 471 published records filed or published between 2015 and mid-2026, drawn from a query built around hydrolyzed polyacrylamide, polymer solution injection, and the specific degradation and retention mechanisms that determine whether a polymer flood performs in the field rather than just in the lab.
Filing activity peaked in 2019 at 47 records and has since moved unevenly, with a sharp step up between 2021 and 2024 that outpaces the slower years either side of it. Because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the most recent one to two years in any such trend understate real activity and should not be read as a slowdown.
Filing trends and technology composition
The chart pairs two views of the same 471-record set: how filing volume moved year over year, and how the underlying technology splits across IPC subclasses. Because a single record can carry several IPC codes, the composition shares add up to more than 100% of records — that is expected and reflects how broadly polymer flooding claims cross into materials, drilling and formulation chemistry.
Filing volume by year
From 42 records in 2017 to a peak of 47 in 2019, the trend line shows the field is active but not accelerating in a straight line; the 2021-2024 step from 4 to 17 records (+325%) is the strongest recent signal, and 2025-2026 figures will fill in as publication catches up.
IPC subclass composition
C09K (materials for misc. applications) and E21B (earth and rock drilling) dominate at 64.3% and 49.9% of the 471 records respectively, confirming that most patent activity sits in polymer chemistry and wellbore mechanics rather than in monitoring or digital control, where G01N and G06F each sit under 5%.
Shares are the percentage of the 471 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Polymer Flooding with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about polymer flooding and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaA representative record: measuring inaccessible pore volume
Assessment of inaccessible pore volume for polymer flooding
Embodiments relate to methods for assessing inaccessible pore volume for polymer flooding. The methods include utilizing nuclear magnetic resonance to monitor polymer-based fluid displacements into porous media. According to an embodiment, the method includes providing a core sample of a porous medium, determining a total pore volume of the core sample, introducing polymer solutions, obtaining nuclear magnetic resonance relaxation time distributions of water within the core sample, and assessing the inaccessible pore volume.Filed by Saudi Arabian Oil Company, published 2020-02-20. It sits squarely in the inaccessible-pore-volume diagnostic space rather than in polymer synthesis, which is a narrower and less crowded claim area than the chemistry itself.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US20140060832A1 | Self-suspending proppants for hydraulic fracturing | 135 |
| 2 | US20140000891A1 | Self-suspending proppants for hydraulic fracturing | 133 |
| 3 | US6281172B1 | Quaternary nitrogen containing amphoteric water soluble polymers and their use in drilling fluids | 126 |
| 4 | WO2012061147A1 | Salt-tolerant, thermally-stable rheology modifiers | 108 |
| 5 | US20130324443A1 | Salt-tolerant, thermally-stable rheology modifiers | 102 |
| 6 | US20100300682A1 | Computer-implemented systems and methods for screening and predicting the performance of enhanced oil recover… | 97 |
| 7 | US20110256085A1 | Rheology modifier compositions and methods of use | 96 |
| 8 | US4485873A | Process for oil recovery from a subterranean reservoir | 89 |
| 9 | US3785437A | Method for controlling formation permeability | 85 |
| 10 | US20170158948A1 | Methods for hydrocarbon recovery | 79 |
Citation counts favour older filings simply because they have had more time to accumulate citations within the searched corpus; treat them as a signal of influence, not of current importance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Three patterns stand out once you separate the concentration figures, the class composition, and the receiving-office spread from the raw record count.
The leader board is short
The top five assignees hold 178 of the 471 records in scope (37.8%), and the top ten hold 264 (56.1%). That is a steep concentration curve for a chemistry-and-mechanics field this broad, meaning a small number of oil majors and specialty chemical suppliers have built dense portfolios while most other filers appear once or twice.
Chemistry is crowded, digital control is not
Materials and drilling classes (C09K, E21B) cover roughly half to two-thirds of records, while data-processing and testing classes stay in the single digits. Reservoir simulation, injectivity monitoring, and automated polymer-dosing control are documented far less densely than the polymer chemistry itself.
A real step-up, not a spike
The three-year jump from 4 to 17 records is the sharpest sustained increase in the trend, arriving after 2019's peak of 47 and a quieter stretch. Read the 2025-2026 tail with the 18-month publication lag in mind rather than as a cooling trend.
US-centric with a PCT and Canada tail
The United States receives nearly triple the filings of any single other office, with WIPO PCT applications and Canada next in line, followed by Europe, the UK and Australia. That pattern fits a field driven by North American unconventional and heavy-oil operators.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to polymer flooding, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who is filing, and where the gaps sit
The ranking covers 100 companies counted by record, not a curated top-50 or top-100 list — it is the full set the data endpoint returns. A leader with 70 records sits well ahead of fifth place at 21 and tenth place at 16, and the co-assignee pairs show at least one long-standing internal filing partnership rather than broad industry co-filing.
One filer well ahead of the field
The top assignee's 70 records dwarf fifth place at 21 and tenth place at 16, indicating a portfolio built over many filing cycles rather than a recent surge. Its strongest internal co-assignee pairing (25 shared records) suggests the portfolio is split across related corporate entities rather than genuinely co-developed with outside partners.
Collaboration is limited and mostly internal
Only ten co-assignee pairs appear across the dataset, and the strongest by far links two entities under the same corporate parent. A services-and-technology pairing at 7 shared records and a national-oil-company pairing at 4 are the next strongest, but true cross-company joint filing is rare in this field.
Recent-year activity has gone quiet across the board
Every one of the six assignees tracked for recent momentum shows zero filings in the latest year. Given the 18-month publication lag, this reads as pipeline still working through rather than genuine withdrawal from the space, but it also means no single filer is visibly accelerating right now.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Chevron USA Inc | 0 | — |
| Saudi Arabian Oil Co | 0 | — |
| Rhodia Operations SAS | 0 | — |
| Marathon Oil Co | 0 | — |
| Chevron Oronite Co LLC | 0 | — |
| Self Suspending Proppant LLC | 0 | — |
| Ecolab USA Inc | 0 | — |
| Geoquest Systems BV | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis next
The figures above describe the shape of the field. Turning that shape into a filing or freedom-to-operate decision means drilling into specific claims and specific assignees.
Run a freedom-to-operate check on a specific mechanism
If you are working on injectivity monitoring or automated dosing, check what the leading assignees actually claim before assuming the sparse IPC coverage means open ground.
Explore in Patsnap Eureka →Track the leader's recent filings by claim scope
A 70-record leader with zero filings in the latest tracked year may be consolidating rather than retreating; watch continuation filings and claim amendments rather than raw counts alone.
Explore in Patsnap Eureka →Map citation influence against current claim scope
The most-cited records here date from earlier filing years; check whether their claims still block current formulations before treating them as settled prior art.
Explore in Patsnap Eureka →Common questions about polymer flooding patents
Most records in this space claim either a polymer formulation or blend designed to control mobility ratio during injection, or a method for characterising how that polymer behaves in the reservoir, such as measuring inaccessible pore volume or shear degradation. The classification data shows C09K (materials for misc. applications) and E21B (earth and rock drilling) covering the largest shares of records, meaning most claims sit in polymer chemistry and wellbore mechanics rather than in software or sensor systems. A smaller share of filings claim testing methods, such as nuclear magnetic resonance-based pore volume assessment, which sit in G01N and appear in a much smaller portion of the dataset.
The ranking of 100 companies is led by a single assignee with 70 records, well ahead of fifth place at 21 and tenth place at 16, so the field has one clear leader rather than a tight cluster at the top. The top five assignees combined hold 37.8% of all 471 records in scope, and the top ten hold 56.1%, which is a meaningfully concentrated field for a chemistry area this broad. Beyond the leaders, the ranking includes a long tail of companies with far fewer filings each, typical of a mature but still active technical area.
Filing activity is not in a straight decline: 2019 was the peak year so far at 47 records, and the field then went through a quieter period before a sharp step-up from 4 records in 2021 to 17 in 2024, a +325% increase over that span. Because patent publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, the lower-looking figures for 2025 and 2026 in most trend charts are incomplete rather than evidence of a slowdown. Anyone assessing momentum should treat the last one to two years of any such chart as provisional.
The clearest gap sits between the heavily claimed materials and drilling classes (C09K at 64.3% of records, E21B at 49.9%) and the thinly claimed digital and diagnostic classes, where G06F (data processing) and G01N (material testing) each cover under 5% of records. That points to real-time injectivity monitoring, automated polymer dosing control, and shear-thinning rheology sensing as areas where the underlying chemistry is well documented but the measurement and control layer around it is not. A first claim in that space would likely combine a sensing or monitoring step with a control action tied to a specific degradation or retention mechanism, rather than claiming the polymer chemistry itself.
Collaboration, in the sense of co-assigned filings between separate organisations, is limited: the dataset identifies only 10 co-assignee pairs in total. The strongest pairing by a wide margin links two entities under the same corporate parent, at 25 shared records, which reflects internal corporate structure more than external partnership. A services-and-operator pairing at 7 records and a national-oil-company pairing at 4 records are the next strongest examples, suggesting most polymer flooding patents are filed by a single assignee acting alone rather than through joint ventures.
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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.