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Run your analysis now →https://www.patsnap.com/resources/blog/rd-blog/software-defined-radio-platforms-patent-landscape/ · Patsnap · data cut-off 2026-07-31 · downloaded from the live page
Patent Landscape · Wireless CommunicationsSoftware Defined Radio Platform Patents: Filing Trends and Who Holds the Ground
- Filing has cooled since its 2019 peak. activity ran 9 families in the peak year down to a partial single-digit count in the latest year, with the 2022 midpoint already down to 3 — a flat-to-declining trend rather than a growing one.
- H04B dominates the claim space. 121 of 130 families sit in transmission-general claims, with H04L digital-transmission overlap in 60 — signal chain and protocol claims are far more contested than demodulation hardware (H03D, just 5).
- No single assignee is filing in the latest year. every assignee tracked for recent-year momentum, including the most active historical filers, shows zero filings in the most recent year — a sign of a maturing, consolidating field rather than an emerging one.
130
Published Records
35%
Top-5 Share of All Records
-100%
Filing Growth 2021→2024
US
Leading Jurisdiction
Filing growth compares 2021 (3 records) with 2024 (0) — 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 130 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
Published byPatsnap Research··7 min readSourced from Patsnap Eureka
Overview
What the SDR platform patent record shows
Software defined radio platforms sit at the intersection of digital signal processing and radio-frequency hardware: the claims in this dataset span digital front-end architecture, sample-rate conversion, FPGA-based reconfigurable receivers, and spectrum sensing. The search covers 130 patent families published between 2015 and mid-2026, filtered to filings that combine SDR or reconfigurable-radio terminology with the implementation-level vocabulary — sample rate, direct conversion, FPGA — that separates working platform claims from generic wireless filings.
Filing concentrated early in the window and has not been replaced by a comparable wave since: the peak year was 2019, and by the 2022 midpoint volume had already dropped to a third of that level. Because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the most recent year in the trend understates true filing activity, but the multi-year decline through the middle of the window is not an artefact of that lag.
Filing activity, 2017-2026
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee ranking and totals. Derived from a Patsnap search on Software Defined Radio Platforms covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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The Data
Filing trends and technology composition
Two views of the same 130-family dataset: how filing volume moved year over year, and how the claims distribute across IPC subclasses.
A declining filing curve after 2019
From 7 families in 2017 up to a peak of 9 in 2019, activity fell to 3 at the 2022 midpoint and continued down to a single partial-year record by 2026. Read the tail years as undercounts given publication lag, but the multi-year decline through the middle of the decade is a real signal, not a lag artefact.
Claims cluster in transmission and digital processing
H04B (transmission, general) appears in 121 of 130 families and H04L (digital information transmission) in 60, confirming that most contested claim territory is in signal-chain and protocol-level architecture rather than in demodulation hardware itself — H03D (demodulation & frequency conversion) accounts for only 5 records.
Shares are the percentage of the 130 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Filing trend and technology composition. Derived from a Patsnap search on Software Defined Radio Platforms covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.
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The most-cited records in this dataset
Representative Filing
Methods for processing a received signal in a software defined radio (SDR) system
OKI TECHNO CENTRE (SINGAPORE) PTE LTD
A receiver architecture built around an analogue-to-digital converter feeding a matched filter and a sample-rate converter, which retimes the digitised signal from the ADC's native sample rate to an output rate defined by the received transmitted signal itself, ahead of demodulation.Filed by OKI Techno Centre (Singapore), published 2005-11-03 — a foundational sample-rate-conversion approach that predates most of the dataset's filing activity.
Highest-citation SDR platform patents
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US20180343567A1 | Private multefire network with SDR-based massive MIMO, multefire and network slicing | 308 |
| 2 | US6091765A | Reconfigurable radio system architecture | 266 |
| 3 | US20150303950A1 | Distributed Software-Defined Radio | 229 |
| 4 | US6823181B1 | Universal platform for software defined radio | 191 |
| 5 | US20050041746A1 | Software-defined wideband holographic communications apparatus and methods | 175 |
| 6 | US20080051129A1 | Radio Communication Device | 87 |
| 7 | US7043023B2 | Software defined radio and radio system | 72 |
| 8 | US20020144134A1 | Software defined radio and radio system | 69 |
| 9 | US10355720B2 | Distributed software-defined radio | 62 |
| 10 | US20140079098A1 | Multi-stage charge re-use analog circuits | 48 |
Citation counts are drawn from a searched corpus and skew toward older filings; treat them as a measure of influence on later filers, not of current commercial relevance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Citation counts and representative records. Derived from a Patsnap search on Software Defined Radio Platforms covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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What the numbers mean for filing strategy
Three patterns stand out once the raw counts are put in context: where claim density sits, how influence concentrates in a handful of early filings, and how filing offices split by geography.
Claim Density
121 / 130
families cite H04B
Transmission-general claims are the densest territory
With 121 of 130 families touching H04B and 60 overlapping H04L, new filings in digital front-end or transmission-chain architecture are entering a crowded field. The overlap between the two subclasses suggests most claims bridge physical-layer transmission with digital protocol handling rather than sitting purely in one or the other.
IPC composition, this dataset
Citation Concentration
308 citations
top-cited record
Influence sits with a small set of early filings
The most-cited record in the set, on private multefire networks with SDR-based massive MIMO, carries 308 citations — well ahead of the rest of the top tier. Because citation counts favour older filings in a searched corpus, this reflects historical influence on subsequent filers more than present-day commercial weight.
Citation ranking, this dataset
Filing Geography
52 US filings
of 130 total
US filings lead, but the split is genuinely multi-jurisdictional
United States filings account for 52 of 130 records, with EPO at 17, WIPO/PCT at 13, and China, Israel and the UK each contributing single-digit counts. A filer targeting only the US office would miss a meaningful share of the competitive and prior-art picture.
Receiving office breakdown, this dataset
Filing Momentum
0 in latest year
across tracked assignees
No tracked assignee is actively filing right now
Every assignee surfaced in recent-year momentum tracking, from historical volume filers to smaller entrants, shows zero filings in the most recent year. Combined with the 2019 peak and subsequent decline, this points to a field where prior claims are largely settled rather than being actively contested by fresh filings.
Recent-year momentum, this dataset
Eureka AI Agent
Looking for what nobody has claimed yet?
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to software defined radio platforms, with the prior art for and against each one.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Co-assignee relationships and derived observations. Derived from a Patsnap search on Software Defined Radio Platforms covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
Players
Who holds the ground, and where it's open
Filing activity has not been concentrated in a single dominant assignee in the most recent years — instead the record shows historical volume filers alongside a long tail of single- or few-filing entrants, plus a small number of co-filing partnerships.
Co-Filing Pattern
10 pairs
co-assignee pairs identified
Co-assignee filing is rare but concentrated
Only 10 co-assignee pairs appear across the dataset, and the strongest pairing links two Sony entities on 5 shared families — a signal of a single corporate group filing jointly across subsidiaries rather than genuine cross-company collaboration.
Co-assignee analysis
Individual Co-Filers
2 filings each
inventor-assignee pairs
Named inventors appear as co-assignees on small filings
Two individual inventor names appear as co-assignees alongside a single corporate filer on 2 families each, a pattern typical of smaller or spin-out teams rather than large-company portfolios.
Co-assignee analysis
Momentum Check
6 assignees, 0 recent filings
latest-year activity
Historical filers have gone quiet
The assignees with the most visible historical presence in this dataset all register zero filings in the most recent tracked year, consistent with the broader decline from the 2019 peak rather than any single company exiting the space.
Recent-year momentum, this dataset
Recent-year filing momentum by assignee
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Harris Corporation | 0 | — |
| Broadcom (Guangjing) | 0 | — |
| L3Harris Technologies | 0 | — |
| BAE SYST AUSTRALIA LTD | 0 | — |
| Nokia Corporation (Finland) | 0 | — |
| SAANKHYA LABS PVT LTD | 0 | — |
| Astrapi Corporation | 0 | — |
| Sony Group Corporation | 0 | — |
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee-level momentum. Derived from a Patsnap search on Software Defined Radio Platforms covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
What's Next
Where to take this next
The dataset points to a settled core and a handful of thinner branches. Two directions make sense depending on what you're trying to decide.
Map freedom-to-operate against the top-cited claims
Before filing in digital front-end or sample-rate-conversion architecture, check claim scope against the highest-cited records in this set, several of which predate most of the dataset and set broad early claims.
Run a claim comparison in EurekaWatch the under-claimed IPC branches
H03D, H04J and H03G show materially lower record counts than H04B and H04L. If your roadmap touches demodulation hardware or multiplex schemes, that thinner claim density is worth confirming before assuming the space is open.
Explore white space in EurekaSource: Patsnap Eureka. Forward-looking reading of the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Software Defined Radio Platforms covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
Based on this dataset of 130 patent families, filing activity is flat to declining rather than growing. Volume peaked in 2019 at 9 families, then fell to 3 by the 2022 midpoint, continuing down toward a single partial-year record by 2026. Because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, the very latest years will always look thinner than they eventually turn out to be, but the multi-year decline through the middle of the window reflects a real slowdown rather than a reporting artefact.
The dataset tracks a set of assignees with historical filing volume, including large defence and telecom names, but none of them show any filings in the most recent tracked year. This points to a field where the core claim territory was established earlier in the window rather than one with an active current leader. Anyone assessing competitive position should look at cumulative family counts and citation influence rather than recent filing pace.
The claims concentrate heavily in H04B, transmission-general architecture, which appears in 121 of the 130 families, with substantial overlap into H04L digital-transmission claims in 60 records. Narrower technical areas — wireless network architecture (H04W), coding and code conversion (H03M), gain and level control (H03G), multiplexing (H04J) and demodulation hardware (H03D) — appear in progressively smaller numbers, showing where claim density thins out relative to the transmission-protocol core.
Relative to the dense H04B and H04L clusters, subclasses like H03D (demodulation and frequency conversion, only 5 records), H04J (multiplex communication, 8 records) and H01B (cables, conductors and insulators, 6 records) carry far fewer filings in this dataset. That does not guarantee an easy grant, but it does mean the claim space around demodulation hardware and multiplexing schemes for reconfigurable radios is less crowded than the core digital front-end and protocol architecture that most filers have already claimed.
The United States receives the largest share in this dataset at 52 of 130 records, followed by the European Patent Office at 17 and WIPO/PCT filings at 13. China, Israel and the United Kingdom each account for single-digit counts. A search or freedom-to-operate review limited to the US office alone would miss roughly three-fifths of the tracked filings, so multi-jurisdiction coverage matters for this technology.
Answers are grounded in the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Software Defined Radio Platforms covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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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.