Precision Agriculture Patents: Who Leads & Where Gaps Are 2026
- Filings grew 43% from 2021 to 2024, climbing from 363 to 518 records a year even before the most recent, still-incomplete years are counted.
- The top five assignees hold 28.1% of all 4,757 records, with the leader alone accounting for 599 — concentration sits at the top, but the ranked field runs 100 names deep.
- Agrochemical claims (A01N) outweigh software claims (G06Q) by 33.0% to 22.6%, so the biggest single claim base is still the biological trait, not the data platform.
Filing growth compares 2021 (363 records) with 2024 (518) — 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 4,757 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What the precision agriculture patent record shows
Precision agriculture patenting spans two distinct claim traditions: agrochemical and biological trait protection carried over from seed and crop-protection companies, and sensing, positioning and data-analytics claims built around field hardware and software. The search set behind this page combines both, pulling 4,757 records published between 2015 and the 2026 cut-off that reference precision or site-specific farming alongside field sensors, plant traits, water application or crop production.
Filing activity has trended upward across the window, with a documented 43% rise in yearly records between 2021 and 2024. Because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the most recent one or two years in any chart will always look lighter than they eventually turn out to be — that is a reporting artefact, not a slowdown.
Filing trends and technology composition
Two views of the same 4,757 records: how filing volume has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses carry the claim weight. Both use the full record set as their denominator.
Filing trend, 2017-2026
Annual records rose from 144 in 2017 to a peak of 699 in 2025, with 2024's 518 the last year that can be read as complete; 2026's 314 so far will keep rising as later publications land.
Technology composition by IPC subclass
A01N (biocides/agrochemicals) leads at 33.0% of the 4,757 records, ahead of G06Q (business/admin data processing) at 22.6% and A01G (horticulture & forestry) at 20.7%. Because records can carry multiple IPC codes, these shares sum to well over 100% and should not be added together.
Shares are the percentage of the 4,757 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Precision Agriculture Patent Landscape with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about precision agriculture patent landscape and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe most-cited records in this field
Modeling and prediction of below-ground performance of agricultural biological products in precision agriculture (US20200257997A1, DTN, LLC)
A below-ground agricultural biological performance modeling approach in precision agriculture combines customized field modeling with machine learning techniques for environmental matching of variables to describe a below-surface soil state, to understand and predict the performance of soil-active agricultural biological products such as bio-pesticides, bio-stimulants, plant growth regulators, and other biologically-derived soil adjuvants.Filed by DTN, LLC and published 2020-08-13, this record sits at the intersection of soil-state modeling and biological-product performance prediction — a claim area distinct from both the seed-trait and the GPS-guidance clusters that dominate the most-cited list.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US7608761B2 | Method for disease control in MON89788 soybean | 1,366 |
| 2 | US6199000B1 | Methods and apparatus for precision agriculture operations utilizing real time kinematic global positioning s… | 641 |
| 3 | US5927603A | Closed loop control system, sensing apparatus and fluid application system for a precision irrigation device | 481 |
| 4 | US5884224A | Mobile mounted remote sensing/application apparatus for interacting with selected areas of interest within a … | 378 |
| 5 | US6553299B1 | Methods and apparatus for precision agriculture operations utilizing real time kinematic global positioning s… | 341 |
| 6 | US20030187560A1 | Methods and apparatus for precision agriculture operations utilizing real time kinematic global positioning s… | 326 |
| 7 | US6041582A | System for recording soil conditions | 316 |
| 8 | US5771169A | Site-specific harvest statistics analyzer | 283 |
| 9 | US6505146B1 | Method and system for spatial evaluation of field and crop performance | 272 |
| 10 | US6016713A | Soil sampling "on the fly" | 269 |
Citation counts favour older filings simply because they have had more time to accumulate citations inside the corpus — treat them as a signal of influence on later work, not as a measure of current commercial importance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Browse MCP servers →What the numbers mean for a filing decision
Three patterns worth acting on before drafting a new application in this space.
The top of the field is dense, the rest is thin
The leading five assignees hold 28.1% of all 4,757 records in scope, and the top ten hold 35.0%. That leaves the majority of filings spread across a long tail of the remaining ranked entrants — a pattern typical of a field with a few entrenched trait and equipment portfolios surrounded by many single- or few-filing entrants.
Filing momentum is real, and recent years understate it
Annual filings rose 43% from 363 in 2021 to 518 in 2024 — the last year in this window that can be treated as complete. Later years in the trend, including the 2025 peak of 699, will keep revising upward as publication catches up with filing.
Biological trait claims still outweigh the software layer
A01N (biocides/agrochemicals) sits at 33.0% of the 4,757 records, ahead of G06Q (business/data processing) at 22.6% and A01G (horticulture/forestry) at 20.7%. A field this often framed as a data-and-sensor story is, by claim volume, still anchored in agrochemical and trait protection.
India leads receiving-office volume, ahead of the US
India's receiving office recorded 1,534 filings against the United States' 1,056, with WIPO (PCT), EPO, Australia and Canada trailing behind. Anyone benchmarking freedom-to-operate needs to check Indian prosecution outcomes, not just US and EPO grants.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to precision agriculture patent landscape, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who is filing, and where the recent momentum sits
The ranked assignee list runs 100 names deep, from a leader with 599 records down to a long tail of single-digit filers. Recent-year momentum tells a different story from historical volume.
One agrochemical/seed portfolio dominates by volume
The leading assignee's 599 records dwarf the fifth-place figure of 84 and the tenth-place figure of 58, showing a steep drop-off rather than a gradual one. That gap matters more than the absolute rank: it signals a single portfolio built over years of trait and formulation filings rather than a cluster of comparably sized competitors.
Recent-year filing has cooled across the largest historical filers
Several of the largest historical assignees show sharp year-over-year declines in the latest year — down 78%, 67%, 88% and 97% for different companies — while one BASF-linked entity still logged 8 filings in the latest year. Given the 18-month publication lag, some of this cooling is a reporting artefact rather than a real pullback, but the divergence between historical leaders and current filers is worth tracking.
Co-filing is limited and clusters around one company
Only 10 co-assignee pairs are documented in this dataset, and the strongest links all involve the same leading assignee paired with named individual inventors or a related entity. Most of the field files independently rather than through joint ventures or cross-licensing structures visible in co-assignment data.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| BASF Agro Trademarks GmbH | 8 | — |
| Bayer AG | 2 | -78% |
| Monsanto Technology LLC | 1 | -67% |
| Sumitomo Chemical Co., Ltd. | 1 | -88% |
| Lovely Professional University | 1 | -97% |
| BASF SE | 0 | -100% |
| Monsanto Co. | 0 | — |
| PI Industries Ltd. | 0 | -100% |
Where to take this from here
The dataset points to specific next steps depending on whether the goal is freedom-to-operate, portfolio strategy, or spotting a filing gap.
Check freedom-to-operate against the dense claim clusters
A01N and G06Q carry the heaviest claim density, so any new filing touching agrochemical trait protection or farm-data analytics should be checked against the leading assignee's portfolio before drafting.
Explore claim density in EurekaModel the white space branches directly
Sub-areas like below-ground soil-state modeling and water-application closed-loop control sit under the leading classes by volume — a targeted claim there faces a thinner prior-art field.
Map white space in EurekaTrack momentum, not just historical rank
Several historically dominant filers show steep year-over-year declines; verify whether that reflects real strategic shifts or simply the publication lag before making competitive assumptions.
Track assignee momentum in EurekaCommon questions about precision agriculture patents
One assignee leads the ranked field with 599 records, well ahead of the fifth-place holder at 84 and the tenth-place holder at 58. That gap indicates a single large agrochemical and seed-trait portfolio rather than several evenly matched competitors. The ranking covers 100 companies in total, so leadership at the very top coexists with a long tail of smaller filers further down the list.
Yes, based on the complete years available: annual filings rose 43% from 363 in 2021 to 518 in 2024. Later years in the dataset, including a nominal peak of 699 in 2025, should be read cautiously because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, meaning recent-year counts will keep rising as more filings are published. The underlying trend through 2024 is one of sustained growth, not slowdown.
By IPC subclass, A01N (biocides and agrochemicals) is the largest at 33.0% of the 4,757 records in scope, followed by G06Q (business and data processing) at 22.6% and A01G (horticulture and forestry) at 20.7%. Because a single patent can carry multiple IPC codes, these percentages overlap and do not sum to 100%. The composition shows that biological and chemical trait claims still outweigh the sensor-and-software claims often associated with the term precision agriculture.
Sub-areas such as below-ground soil-state modeling, biological trait performance prediction, and water-application closed-loop control show up in the record set but at meaningfully lower volume than the leading agrochemical and business-data classes. These branches sit adjacent to heavily filed territory without being saturated themselves, making them reasonable candidates for a first claim if the underlying technology supports one. Any gap assessment should still be paired with a direct freedom-to-operate check against the top-ranked assignees.
India's receiving office recorded the highest volume in this dataset at 1,534 filings, ahead of the United States at 1,056, WIPO's PCT route at 507, and the European Patent Office at 389, with Australia and Canada further behind at 291 and 237 respectively. This ordering means that a US- or Europe-only prior-art search will miss a substantial share of the documented filing activity. Anyone assessing risk or opportunity in this field should include Indian prosecution records in the review.
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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.