Solenoid Valve Patents: Leaders, Trends & White Space 2026
- Filing peaked in 2017 at 39 records and has trended flat to declining through the 2022 midpoint of 12, meaning claim pressure has eased rather than intensified in recent years.
- The top 5 assignees hold just 13.8% of all 763 records in scope, and the top 10 only 23.7% — this is a fragmented field, not a cartel of a few blocking players.
- F16K valve claims cover 80.7% of records while H01F magnetics sit at 26.9% and F15B fluid-pressure systems at 12.2%, showing where density concentrates and where it thins out.
What this landscape covers
Solenoid valves and electromagnetic actuators sit at the intersection of fluid control and electromagnetics, and the 763 records in scope span everything from proportional valve control circuits to holding-current reduction schemes and coil temperature management. The search combines valve, actuator and proportional-solenoid terminology with response-time, flow-capacity and media-compatibility qualifiers, so the corpus is weighted toward records that make functional performance claims rather than pure mechanical construction.
Coverage runs from 2015 through the 2026-07-31 cut-off. Because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, the last one or two years in any trend line will look thinner than they eventually turn out to be — treat the most recent year as a floor, not a ceiling.
Filing trends and technology composition
Two views of the same 763 records: how filing activity has moved year over year, and how the underlying IPC classes distribute across the corpus.
Filing trend: a peak already behind the field
Annual filings rose to a peak of 39 in 2017, then eased toward a midpoint of 12 by 2022. That trajectory points to a technology whose core claim space filled early rather than one still accelerating — new entrants now compete against a decade of prior art rather than a wide-open field.
Technology composition: valve mechanics dominate, magnetics is the second layer
F16K (valves & taps) appears in 80.7% of the 763 records, confirming that most filings anchor on valve mechanism claims even when the invention is really about the coil or drive electronics. H01F (magnets, inductors & transformers) at 26.9% and F15B (fluid-pressure actuators) at 12.2% mark the next layers down, with F02M, B60T, G05D, H01H and F02D each covering a narrower automotive- or control-adjacent slice. Because records can carry multiple classes, these shares sum to more than 100% and should be read as overlap, not as a partition of the field.
Shares are the percentage of the 763 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Solenoid Valves and Electromagnetic Actuators with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about solenoid valves and electromagnetic actuators and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe most-cited records in this space
US5915667A — Proportional solenoid valve control system
A proportional solenoid valve control system applicable to hydraulic systems of heavy equipment, automatic transmission systems and fuel injectors. The main circuitry combines a switching element, proportional solenoid valve and current detection resistor with a control circuit built from current command detection, offset correction, current command adding and limiting, a proportional-integral controller and pulse-width-modulation output stages to precisely control coil current.Filed by Fairchild Korea Semiconductor, granted 1999 — a foundational example of closed-loop current control for proportional solenoids.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US20120228395A1 | Electrically actuated valve for control of instantaneous pressure drop and cyclic durations of flow | 124 |
| 2 | US5085402A | High speed solenoid valve actuator | 102 |
| 3 | US6493204B1 | Modulated voltage for a solenoid valve | 101 |
| 4 | US5199855A | Variable capacity compressor having a capacity control system using an electromagnetic valve | 99 |
| 5 | US5806565A | Hydraulic valves | 97 |
| 6 | US20040025949A1 | Electromagnetic actuator and integrated actuator and fluid flow control valve | 96 |
| 7 | US4459819A | Pulse controlled expansion valve and method | 96 |
| 8 | US4102526A | Solenoid valve | 96 |
| 9 | US4540154A | Solenoid valve | 92 |
| 10 | US4651535A | Pulse controlled solenoid valve | 84 |
Citation counts are drawn from within this searched corpus and skew toward older filings, which have simply had more time to accumulate citations — read them as a signal of influence, not of current relevance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Three read-throughs from the concentration, trend and citation data above.
No single player blocks the field
With the leading five assignees holding only 13.8% of all 763 records and the leading ten reaching 23.7%, this is a fragmented ownership structure. A freedom-to-operate review has to check a long tail of single- and few-filing entrants rather than clearing a handful of dominant portfolios.
The filing wave has already crested
Annual filings peaked at 39 in 2017 and had fallen to 12 by the 2022 midpoint. That decline suggests the core mechanical and control-circuit claim space was staked out in the mid-2010s, and later entrants are filing into an already-dense prior-art base rather than a growing one.
Influence sits with older US filings
The most-cited records in the corpus date back to the 1990s and early 2010s and were filed through the US route, which also leads all receiving offices at 210 records. New filers should expect examiners to cite these foundational documents regardless of jurisdiction.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to solenoid valves and electromagnetic actuators, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who is filing, and where momentum has gone quiet
The ranking covers 100 companies counted by record — the full set the data endpoint returns, not a curated top list. The leader holds 32 records, fifth place 17, tenth place 14, and momentum across the tracked names has flattened at zero in the latest year across the board.
A modest lead, not a moat
The top-ranked assignee holds 32 of 763 records, well ahead of individual peers but nowhere near a controlling share of the field. That gap narrows quickly: fifth place holds 17 and tenth place 14, showing a gradual taper rather than a cliff.
Recent-year filing has gone quiet at the top
Every assignee tracked for recent-year momentum shows zero filings in the latest year, consistent with the broader decline from the 2017 peak. This likely reflects publication lag as much as a real pullback, so treat it as an open question rather than a confirmed retreat.
Co-filing is limited and concentrated
Only 10 co-assignee pairs appear in the dataset, and the strongest pairings link a single corporate parent with its automotive-systems affiliate or individual named inventors. Cross-company joint filing is not a notable feature of this field.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| MAC Valves Inc. | 0 | — |
| Eaton Corporation | 0 | — |
| ASCO LP | 0 | — |
| Robert Bosch GmbH | 0 | — |
| Hitachi, Ltd. | 0 | — |
| Parker Hannifin Corporation | 0 | — |
| Denso Corporation | 0 | — |
| Danfoss A/S | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to specific next steps depending on whether the goal is freedom-to-operate, white-space filing, or competitive tracking.
Run a freedom-to-operate check against the long tail
With ownership this fragmented, a single top-assignee search will miss most of the risk. Screen the full ranked set, not just the leaders, before committing to a valve mechanism or coil-control claim.
Explore assignee data in EurekaPressure-test claims against the top-cited prior art
The five most-cited records anchor examiner expectations across jurisdictions. Draft around their specific control-circuit and mechanism language before filing new proportional-solenoid claims.
Review cited records in EurekaWatch for the lagged 2024–2026 filings to land
The apparent drop to zero in the latest year is partly a publication-lag artefact. Re-run the trend view in six months to see whether the decline from the 2017 peak is real or an early read.
Track filing trends in EurekaCommon questions about solenoid valve patents
The dataset ranks 100 companies by record count, with the leading assignee holding 32 of the 763 records in scope. Ownership is fragmented rather than concentrated: the top 5 assignees combined hold only 13.8% of all records, and the top 10 reach 23.7%. Names appearing in this space include established fluid-control and automotive suppliers, but no single company controls a dominant share, so a competitive review needs to look well beyond the top few names.
Filing activity peaked in 2017 at 39 records and had declined to 12 by the 2022 midpoint, indicating the field has passed its most active filing period. Recent-year momentum across tracked leading assignees shows zero filings in the latest year, though this is partly explained by the roughly 18-month lag between filing and publication. The realistic read is a mature field with slowing new filing rather than one still expanding rapidly.
F16K, covering valves and taps, appears in 80.7% of the 763 records and is the dominant class regardless of what the invention actually improves. H01F (magnets, inductors and transformers) covers 26.9% of records and F15B (fluid-pressure actuators) covers 12.2%, marking the electromagnetic-drive and hydraulic-system layers respectively. Because records often carry multiple classes, these figures overlap rather than partition the field, and a thorough prior-art search should span at least the F16K and H01F combination.
US5915667A claims a proportional solenoid valve control system built around current command detection, offset correction, current command adding and limiting, and pulse-width-modulation output driving the coil current. Anyone building a closed-loop current-control circuit for a proportional solenoid using this general architecture — detection, offset, PWM output — needs to check claim scope against this record, since it is one of the more heavily cited documents in the corpus. Workable alternatives typically shift the control approach, for example using different feedback variables or a digital control loop structure rather than the specific analogue offset-and-limit chain described.
The technology composition shows steep drop-off outside the F16K and H01F core: classes like G05D (control of non-electric variables) and H01H (switches & relays) sit at 6.2% and 5.8% of records respectively, well below the valve-mechanism core. That gap suggests holding-current reduction, coil temperature compensation and media-compatibility sealing are documented but not densely claimed. Combined with a flat-to-declining filing trend since 2017, these narrower functional branches are a more defensible place to file a first claim than the crowded core valve-mechanism space.
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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.