RIS Beamforming Patents: Top Companies & Filing Trends 2026
- Filing peaked in 2023 at 56 families, then slowed — the midpoint year 2022 already carried 47, so growth had flattened before the most recent partial year.
- H04B transmission claims dominate at 216 of 242 records, while H01Q antenna-hardware claims sit far behind at 84 — most of the contested ground is in signal/control, not the surface hardware itself.
- Every tracked assignee shows 0 filings in the latest year, including several with -100% YoY — a momentum gap that is partly a publication-lag artefact but still worth checking before assuming any single filer is pulling ahead.
Filing growth compares 2021 (33 records) with 2024 (46) — 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 242 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this landscape covers
Reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) beamforming covers the control methods and phase-configuration schemes that let a passive or semi-passive reflecting panel steer, focus or cancel wireless signals without a traditional active antenna array. This dataset tracks 242 patent families published between 2015 and mid-2026 that combine RIS/intelligent-reflecting-surface terminology with claims on passive beamforming, phase configuration, reflection beamforming or beam steering, filtered to the antenna and radio-transmission IPC classes where this control layer is actually claimed.
Filing activity is concentrated in the years after 2020, tracking the broader academic and standards interest in RIS as a 6G physical-layer candidate. Because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the last one to two years in any chart understate real filing activity — read the recent downturn as partly a reporting artefact, not purely a demand signal.
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 242-family corpus: how filing activity has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses carry the claim density.
Filing trend: rise, peak, plateau
Filings moved from zero in 2017 to a peak of 56 in 2023, with 2022 already at 47 — the growth curve had largely flattened by the midpoint of the window rather than continuing to climb into the peak year.
Where the claims sit
H04B (general transmission) covers 216 of 242 records and H01Q (antennas) covers 84 — the two overlap heavily, since most filings claim a control method applied to a reflecting antenna structure. H04W, H04L, G01S, G06N, G02F and H02J each appear in a minority of filings, marking network-integration, AI-driven control, sensing, optical and power-supply angles as secondary but present.
Shares are the percentage of the 242 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface Beamforming with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about reconfigurable intelligent surface beamforming and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaMost-cited prior art in this corpus
EP4564603B1 — Composite reconfigurable intelligent surface system for real-time beam steering
Filed by Tata Consultancy Services Limited and granted 2026-07-08, this record describes a composite RIS system architecture aimed at real-time beam steering control.Original title filed in German; translated here for readability.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | WO2021236510A1 | Position control of adaptive phase-changing devices | 77 |
| 2 | CN111865387A | 智能反射面辅助无线通信系统的波束成形设计方法 | 49 |
| 3 | WO2023037243A1 | Reconfigurable intelligent surface enabled leakage suppression and signal power maximization system and method | 42 |
| 4 | US20230208479A1 | Position Control of Adaptive Phase-Changing Devices | 42 |
| 5 | CN112260740A | 可重构智能表面辅助的共生通信系统波束赋形设计方法 | 38 |
| 6 | CN113973305A | 搭载于无人机上的智能反射面位置和波束联合优化方法 | 37 |
| 7 | WO2023025888A2 | Reconfigurable relay discovery for blindspot avoidance | 32 |
| 8 | US20230308139A1 | Systems and methods for MIMO communication with controllable environments | 26 |
| 9 | CN111163511A | 智能反射表面辅助的毫米波通信中延迟受限的上行功率分配方法 | 24 |
| 10 | WO2022133952A1 | Systems and methods for MIMO communication with controllable environments | 22 |
Citation counts are drawn from the searched corpus only and favour older filings; treat them as a signal of influence on subsequent filers, not of current commercial relevance.
Patent titles are shown in the language they were filed in, not translated, so that each record stays verifiable against the original filing — a translated title will not match in Eureka or in any national register. 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 read-throughs from the trend, IPC and citation data that matter more than the raw counts on their own.
The growth phase is behind, not ahead
Filings rose from zero in 2017 to a peak of 56 in 2023, but the midpoint year 2022 was already at 47 — most of the growth happened early, and the curve was flattening well before the peak. A filer entering now is entering a plateaued field, not a rising one.
Control-layer claims, not hardware, are the crowded ground
H04B (transmission) appears in 216 of 242 records against 84 for H01Q (antennas). The contested claim space is the phase-configuration and signal-control method, applied to a reflecting surface, rather than the surface hardware itself.
Filing geography is broader than a single jurisdiction
The United States (60) and India (51) lead receiving-office counts, ahead of WIPO/PCT (44), Europe (42) and China (39). A freedom-to-operate check confined to one office would miss a meaningful share of the corpus.
The most-cited prior art is method-level, not device-level
The highest-cited record in this corpus concerns position control of adaptive phase-changing devices, and the next tier includes beamforming-design methods for RIS-assisted systems. Influence sits with the control method, reinforcing where later filers have concentrated their own claims.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to reconfigurable intelligent surface beamforming, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who is filing, and where the field is thin
Assignee activity across this corpus shows a familiar shape: a handful of large telecom and technology filers, a co-filing network built around inventor teams, and a broad tail of single-family entrants — while momentum has stalled across the board in the most recent year.
Co-filing concentrates around a small inventor network
The strongest co-assignee pairs all link one large assignee to individual named inventors, each appearing at a shared count of 4. This points to a compact internal R&D group rather than a broad cross-company collaboration pattern.
Every tracked assignee shows zero filings in the latest year
Large filers including major telecom-equipment and technology companies show 0 filings in the latest year, several logged as -100% YoY. Given the roughly 18-month publication lag, this is as likely to reflect filings still working through the pipeline as a genuine pullback.
No single office dominates filing strategy
Five receiving offices — the US, India, WIPO, Europe and China — each carry at least 39 records, with Australia trailing at 2. Filers are clearly pursuing multi-jurisdiction protection rather than concentrating on a home market.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Qualcomm Incorporated | 0 | -100% |
| Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. (South Korea) | 0 | -100% |
| Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. | 0 | — |
| Dell Products L.P. | 0 | -100% |
| NEC Laboratories Europe GmbH | 0 | -100% |
| Google LLC | 0 | — |
| Chongqing University of Posts and Telecommunications | 0 | — |
| Koninklijke Philips N.V. (Royal Philips) | 0 | — |
Taking this further
The trend and ranking answer where the field has been. Deciding where to file next means testing specific claim language against this corpus.
Check a draft claim against this corpus
Run a specific phase-configuration or beam-steering claim against the 242 families here to see how closely it reads onto existing method claims before drafting further.
Open Eureka →Track the assignees that go quiet
Several large filers show zero filings in the latest year. Watching whether that resumes or continues is useful signal for competitive positioning over the next filing cycle.
Open Eureka →Explore the under-claimed branches
AI-driven control, radar fusion and optical phase-shift elements each show a small footprint relative to the core transmission claims — worth a deeper prior-art pull before committing to a direction.
Open Eureka →Common questions on RIS beamforming patents
This landscape tracks 242 patent families published between 2015 and mid-2026 that combine RIS or intelligent-reflecting-surface terminology with claims on passive beamforming, phase configuration, reflection beamforming or beam steering. The figure counts families rather than raw document counts, which is the fairer unit since it neutralises duplicate continuation and multi-jurisdiction filings of the same invention. Filing activity is concentrated from 2020 onward, with a peak of 56 families in 2023.
The corpus includes major telecom-equipment and technology filers alongside university and research-institute assignees, with a co-filing network built around a small group of named inventors tied to one large assignee. Recent-year data shows every tracked major assignee at zero filings in the most recent year, which given the roughly 18-month publication lag likely understates true recent activity rather than indicating an actual pullback. No single company holds a dominant multi-year lead in this dataset.
Filing rose from zero in 2017 to a peak of 56 families in 2023, but the growth had already largely flattened by 2022, which logged 47 filings. That pattern — rapid rise followed by a plateau rather than continued acceleration — suggests the field's claim space around core beamforming methods is now well-established rather than still opening up. The most recent one to two years in any such trend are understated due to publication lag, so a renewed rise is possible but not yet visible in the data.
The core claim density sits heavily in H04B transmission methods (216 of 242 records) and H01Q antenna structures (84 records), meaning most protected ground is in the control and signalling layer rather than the reflecting hardware. Adjacent branches — AI-driven phase-configuration control, RIS-assisted radar and positioning fusion, optical phase-shift element control, and power/energy-harvesting for passive panels — each appear in single digits of records. These smaller subclasses are candidates for more open drafting room, though a full freedom-to-operate search is still needed before committing claim language there.
The United States leads receiving-office counts at 60 records, followed by India at 51, WIPO/PCT filings at 44, Europe at 42 and China at 39; Australia trails with only 2. This spread indicates that filers in this space are pursuing broad multi-jurisdiction protection rather than concentrating on a single home market. A freedom-to-operate review limited to just one or two of these offices would miss a substantial share of the relevant prior art.
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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.