Polyurethane Systems Patents: Top Companies & Filing Trends 2026
- Filing has cooled since 2019. 798 families that year fell to 495 by 2022 and to single digits by 2026, so the field looks more settled than growing.
- Condensation chemistry dominates the IPC mix. C08G alone accounts for 18,239 records, more than the next three subclasses combined – foam and coatings claims sit on very dense prior art.
- The largest co-filing pair dwarfs the rest. Dow Global Technologies and Rohm and Haas co-assign 107 families together, far ahead of the next strongest pairing at 43.
Filing growth compares 2021 (610 records) with 2024 (313) — 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 66,548 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this landscape covers
This dataset tracks 66,548 patent families filed between 2015 and mid-2026 that combine polyurethane, isocyanate prepolymer or PU resin terminology in the title or abstract with formulation-specific language – chain extender ratios, NCO content, foam formulation, waterborne dispersion or hardness – in the claims or description. The IPC scope is anchored on C08G18 (polyurethane condensation chemistry), C08L75 (polyurethane compositions) and C09D175 (polyurethane coatings), which keeps the corpus focused on formulation and process claims rather than end-use articles.
Filing activity peaked in 2019 and has declined through the following years; because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the last one to two years in any chart will understate real activity. Family counts, not raw document counts, are used throughout so that multi-jurisdiction and continuation filing does not inflate any single assignee's footprint.
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Filing trends and technology composition
Two views of the same corpus: how filing volume has moved year over year, and how the 66,548 families split across the IPC subclasses that define this space.
A field past its filing peak
Annual filings rose to a peak of 798 in 2019, roughly held at 495 by the 2022 midpoint, and have since dropped sharply toward single digits in the most recent, still-incomplete year – consistent with a maturing claim landscape rather than an emerging one.
Condensation chemistry leads by a wide margin
C08G (condensation polymers) carries 18,239 records versus 5,711 for C08L compositions and 4,552 for C09D coatings; adhesives (C09J), laminates (B32B) and plastics shaping (B29C) each sit under 1,800 records, marking them as comparatively lighter-claimed corners of the same chemistry.
Shares are the percentage of the 66,548 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Polyurethane Systems and Prepolymers with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about polyurethane systems and prepolymers and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaRepresentative and most-cited filings
US4714574A – Process for making polyurethane foam
A flexible polyurethane foam article with regions of different hardness is made by introducing into a mould a foam formulation giving a foam of a given hardness and then introducing a foam formulation giving a foam of different hardness directly onto the first foam formulation at a time corresponding to a volume expansion in the range 100% to 2300%.Granted 1987, originally filed as PCT/GB82/00185 by Polyol International BV – an early claim to multi-hardness foam-in-mould processing that predates most of the corpus.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US6443988B2 | Mold apparatus and kit for in situ tissue repair | 938 |
| 2 | US4345053A | Silicon-terminated polyurethane polymer | 751 |
| 3 | US6306177B1 | Biomaterial system for in situ tissue repair | 706 |
| 4 | US5100992A | Polyurethane-based polymeric materials and biomedical articles and pharmaceutical compositions utilizing the … | 607 |
| 5 | US9453142B2 | Polyurethane resins having multiple mechanisms of hardening for use in producing three-dimensional objects | 602 |
| 6 | US6140452A | Biomaterial for in situ tissue repair | 573 |
| 7 | US6080488A | Slippery, tenaciously adhering hydrophilic polyurethane hydrogel coatings, coated metal substrate materials, … | 550 |
| 8 | US4147679A | Water-reduced urethane coating compositions | 543 |
| 9 | US3905929A | Aqueous dispersions of polyurethane having side chain polyoxyethylene units | 519 |
| 10 | US4046729A | Water-reduced urethane coating compositions | 515 |
Citation counts reflect influence inside this searched corpus and skew toward older records; they are not a measure of current commercial relevance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Browse MCP servers →What the numbers imply for filing strategy
Reading the trend, the IPC split and the citation table together points to a field where the core chemistry is heavily claimed and the remaining opportunity is at the edges.
Volume has been declining for years, not just recently
The drop from 798 families in 2019 to 495 by 2022 shows the slowdown started well before the most recent, publication-lag-affected years. This is a signal of a settled core chemistry, not a sudden pullback.
One subclass carries more than half the corpus
C08G alone outweighs C08L, C09D, C08J, C08K, C09J, B32B and B29C individually, and exceeds the combined total of the next three. New entrants filing foam or prepolymer synthesis claims are filing into the densest part of the map.
The oldest, most-cited records sit outside core PU chemistry
The most-cited documents in this corpus are biomedical tissue-repair and mould-apparatus patents that happen to use polyurethane materials, not formulation patents per se – a reminder that citation counts favour early, broadly-applicable filings over recent formulation-specific ones.
Co-assignment is concentrated in one dominant pairing
The strongest co-assignee pair files together more than twice as often as the second-strongest (Covestro Deutschland + Bayer MaterialScience at 43), suggesting integrated corporate structures rather than broad industry-wide co-development.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to polyurethane systems and prepolymers, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who is filing, and who has slowed down
Recent-year momentum tells a different story from historical volume: several of the assignees with the deepest portfolios have pulled back sharply in the latest reported year.
Large incumbents are filing far less than they used to
BASF SE recorded just 2 families in the latest year, down 88% year over year. Dow Global Technologies moved to zero, a 100% decline, and Covestro Deutschland likewise dropped to zero. This pattern across multiple large filers points to a category where core claims are considered settled rather than one where budgets have simply moved elsewhere.
Filing is concentrated in a handful of jurisdictions
The United States leads with 7,658 filings, ahead of the EPO (5,395), WIPO/PCT (2,416) and Canada (2,332). Australia and the United Kingdom trail well behind, suggesting most applicants treat US, European and PCT routes as the primary gate and file more selectively elsewhere.
Collaboration is narrow and corporate-internal
Only ten co-assignee pairs appear in the data, and the top three are all affiliated entities within the same corporate families – Dow with Rohm and Haas, Covestro with Bayer MaterialScience, Dow with Dow Silicones. Cross-company joint filing outside these structures is rare in this corpus.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| BASF SE | 2 | -88% |
| Lubrizol Advanced Materials, Inc. | 1 | -75% |
| Huntsman International LLC | 1 | -50% |
| Dow Global Technologies LLC | 0 | -100% |
| Bayer AG | 0 | — |
| Covestro Deutschland AG | 0 | -100% |
| Dow Chemical Company | 0 | — |
| Air Products and Chemicals, Inc. | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
The aggregate trend and rankings are a starting point. The next step is usually narrowing to a specific claim element or assignee and checking freedom to operate against it.
Check freedom to operate on a specific formulation
Run a targeted search against the chain-extender ratio, NCO content or hardness range you plan to claim, rather than relying on the aggregate IPC split shown here.
Explore in Patsnap EurekaTrack momentum shifts among large filers
Several major assignees dropped to zero or near-zero in the latest year; monitoring whether that continues or reverses can flag when incumbents re-enter a sub-area.
Set up monitoring in Patsnap EurekaInvestigate the under-claimed branches directly
Adhesives, laminates and shaping subclasses carry a fraction of the filing density of core condensation chemistry – worth a dedicated search before assuming the space is open.
Search white space in Patsnap EurekaFrequently asked questions
Historical filing volume is concentrated among a small group of large chemical companies, with Dow-affiliated entities, BASF and Covestro/Bayer-affiliated entities among the most prominent based on co-assignment patterns in this corpus. However, recent-year momentum data shows several of these same companies filing far fewer new families than in previous years – BASF SE fell 88% year over year, for example – so historical leadership does not necessarily indicate current filing priority. Anyone assessing this space should look at both cumulative volume and recent-year trend before drawing conclusions about who is actively investing.
No, filing volume has been declining for several years. Annual filings peaked at 798 in 2019, had fallen to 495 by the 2022 midpoint, and dropped to the low double digits by the most recent year in this dataset. Some of that final-year drop reflects the roughly 18-month lag between filing and publication, but the multi-year decline through 2022 predates that effect and points to a genuinely maturing filing pattern rather than a temporary dip.
Condensation polymer chemistry, classified under IPC C08G, dominates the corpus with 18,239 records – more than the next three subclasses (C08L polymer compositions, C09D coatings and C08J polymer processing) combined. This concentration means core prepolymer synthesis and foam formulation claims sit on dense prior art. Adjacent areas such as adhesives (C09J), laminated structures (B32B) and plastics shaping (B29C) each carry under 1,800 records and represent comparatively lighter-claimed ground within the same broad chemistry.
US4714574A, granted in 1987 to Polyol International BV, claims a process for making flexible polyurethane foam with regions of different hardness by introducing a second foam formulation onto a first one at a specific volume-expansion window. Given its 1987 grant date, its core patent term has long since expired, so it functions today mainly as prior art rather than an active blocking right. New filings in multi-hardness foam-in-mould processing should still review its claim language closely, since expired patents remain fully citable against novelty and obviousness.
The subclasses with the lowest record counts relative to the corpus – adhesives (C09J at 1,723), laminated products (B32B at 1,283) and plastics shaping (B29C at 1,200) – carry a fraction of the filing density seen in core condensation chemistry (C08G at 18,239). That gap does not guarantee an easy filing, but it does mean claim space in those branches is comparatively less occupied. Waterborne dispersion stability and additive-driven hardness tuning are two formulation-specific angles within those lighter subclasses worth a dedicated freedom-to-operate search before committing to a claim strategy.
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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.