Proton and Ion Beam Therapy Patents: Who Leads, Where Gaps Are 2026
Proton and Ion Beam Therapy Patents: Filing Trends and the Field's Leading Claimants
25.4% of the field sits with five assignees. The top 5 combined account for 908 of 3,578 records in scope — a concentrated core surrounded by a long tail across the other 95 ranked assignees. Annual filings ran from 261 in 2017 down to 8 in 2026 (a partial year). The more reliable read is 2021 to 2024, where filings fell from 254 to 84 records — a 67% drop over three years. Counts for 2025 and 2026 will keep rising as publication catches up with filing, roughly an 18-month lag, so treat the most recent two years as undercounted rather than as evidence of a further decline.
- 1RAYSEARCH LAB254
- 2XYLECO INC176
- 3LOMA LINDA UNIV MEDICAL CENT172
- 4ION BEAM APPL164
- 5BALAKIN PAVEL VLADIMIROVICH142
See the full proton and ion beam therapy analysis in Eureka
- The complete ranking, not just the top five
- Every IPC branch with its share of the corpus
- The most-cited records, and where claim space is still thin
Common questions about this landscape
Who are the leading patent holders in proton and ion beam therapy?
The ranked assignee list shows one clear leader with 254 records, well ahead of fifth place at 142 and tenth place at 81. The top five assignees combined hold 908 records, or 25.4% of the 3,578 records in scope, and the top ten hold 40.6%. Beyond that, the ranking runs to 100 assignees with a long tail of much smaller filers, so due diligence should not assume the field is evenly spread.
Is proton therapy patent filing growing or slowing down?
Filings peaked in 2017 at 261 records and have declined since; between 2021 and 2024, the last year that can be read as complete, filings fell from 254 to 84, a 67% drop. Figures for 2025 and 2026 look lower still, but that is largely an artefact of publication lag — publication typically trails filing by around 18 months, so recent years will keep revising upward. Treat 2024 as the most recent reliable data point for judging real momentum.
What technology areas does proton and ion beam therapy patent activity cover?
Two-thirds of records (66.9%) fall under A61N, the electrotherapy and radiation therapy classification covering clinical delivery systems. A smaller but distinct layer covers the physical accelerator and beam-handling hardware: G21K (particle and radiation handling, 12.7%), H05H (particle accelerators, 10.7%) and G01T (radiation measurement, 10.5%). Because a single patent can carry multiple IPC codes, these percentages overlap rather than summing to 100%.
Disclaimer. This analysis is based on Patsnap Eureka data drawn from a limited snapshot of global patent records and is provided for general information and reference only. Patent data carries inherent limitations — recent filings are under-counted because of publication lag, counts may be on a record or family basis, classification and applicant-name data may contain errors or duplicates, and the underlying search query defines the scope shown — so the analysis may be incomplete or inaccurate and may not reflect the full technology landscape.
Nothing here is an exhaustive prior-art, novelty, freedom-to-operate or validity search, nor does it constitute legal, financial or professional advice, and it should not be relied upon as such. Verify independently and review with qualified patent and legal professionals before acting on it.
Method: Filing trend and technology composition. Derived from a Patsnap search on Proton and Ion Beam Therapy covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish. Every share divides by all records in scope. Data: Patsnap Eureka. See the full landscape report.