Subsea Multiphase Pump Patents: Leaders, Trends & White Space 2026
Filing growth compares 2021 (25 records) with 2024 (3) — 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 744 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What the subsea multiphase pump filing record actually shows
Subsea multiphase pumping sits at the intersection of well engineering and rotating equipment: a single record can claim a pump, a separator, and a drilling or flow-control element in the same family. The dataset behind this page covers 744 published records filed or published between 2015 and mid-2026, indexed by IPC subclass, assignee and receiving office. Earth and rock drilling (E21B) is the most frequently tagged class at 61.3% of records, which reflects how tightly subsea pump claims are bundled with wellbore and completion equipment rather than filed as standalone mechanical patents.
Filing concentrated hard at the top: the five leading assignees between them account for 41.5% of all records, and the top ten for 59.8%. That leaves a long tail of single- or few-filing entrants competing for the remaining share, mostly in adjacent measurement and separation classes rather than in the core pump mechanism itself.
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views matter here: how filing volume has moved year over year, and how records split across the IPC subclasses that make up a subsea multiphase pump system.
A sharp pullback after 2021, not a gradual slowdown
Filings peaked at 44 records in 2019 and held near that level through 2021 at 25 records, then dropped to 3 records by 2024 — an 88% fall over three years. 2025 and 2026 figures are still incomplete because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so the most recent bars will fill in over time and should not yet be read as continued decline.
Drilling-adjacent claims dominate the class mix
E21B (earth and rock drilling) touches 61.3% of the 744 records, followed by F04D (non-positive-displacement pumps) at 26.6% and B01D (separation processes) at 15.9%. Positive-displacement pumps (F04B), pipeline transport (F17D) and fuels (C10L) each sit in the 5-6% range, and flow measurement and material analysis classes trail under 4% — a sign that instrumentation and analysis around the pump are comparatively under-claimed next to the mechanical core.
Shares are the percentage of the 744 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Subsea Production Systems: Subsea Multiphase Pump Patent Landscape with Eureka
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Try EurekaThe most-cited records anchoring this field
Multiphase pressure boosting pump
The invention provides a system for multiphase pumping, preferably for subsea application, distinctive in that it comprises a multiphase pressure boosting pump and a separator, preferably adapted for subsea operation, a multiphase fluid inlet connected to the pump, a multiphase outlet from the separator, an outlet of the pump arranged to an inlet of the separator, a liquid outlet of the separator arranged to a liquid inlet on the pump, and a power recovery turbine arranged between said liquid outlet of the separator and said liquid inlet on the pump.Filed by Aker Subsea AS, published 2015-11-05. The claim couples a boosting pump to an on-board separator and routes recovered liquid through a power recovery turbine back into the pump inlet — a closed-loop energy recovery architecture that later filings in the same class have had to design around or license.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US6457950B1 | Sealless multiphase screw-pump-and-motor package | 208 |
| 2 | US4848471A | Method and apparatus for transporting unprocessed well streams | 89 |
| 3 | US20160341281A1 | Subsea gear train system | 82 |
| 4 | US5135684A | Multiphase process mixing and measuring system | 81 |
| 5 | WO2007092956A2 | Managed pressure and/or temperature drilling system and method | 79 |
| 6 | US20040031622A1 | Methods and apparatus for drilling with a multiphase pump | 76 |
| 7 | US20050145388A1 | Subsea process assembly | 76 |
| 8 | GB2242373A | Crude oil separator | 70 |
| 9 | US20060162934A1 | Subsea Pumping System | 65 |
| 10 | US20070274842A1 | Subsea multiphase pumping systems | 64 |
Citation counts inside a searched corpus favour older filings that have had more time to accumulate references — treat them as a signal of influence on subsequent filers, not as a ranking of current commercial relevance.
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Reading the ranking and the class breakdown together points to where claim space is already crowded and where a new filing has room to move.
The top of the field is narrow
The leading assignee alone holds 110 records, roughly three times the fifth-place company's 39. A new entrant filing a core pump mechanism claim is filing directly against a small group of repeat filers rather than into open territory.
A fast pullback, not a slow fade
The drop from 25 records in 2021 to 3 in 2024 happened inside three years, which suggests a deliberate reallocation of R&D or filing budget rather than a market running out of ideas. 2025-2026 figures are still incomplete and should not be read into this trend yet.
Instrumentation is thin next to the mechanism
Flow, level and volume measurement (G01F) and material analysis (G01N) each sit under 4% of records, far behind the 61.3% carried by drilling-adjacent claims. Sensing and condition-monitoring claims around the pump look comparatively open.
Joint filings are rare and concentrated
Only ten co-assignee pairings appear in the dataset, and the strongest recur around the same handful of organisations. Most records in this field are filed by a single assignee rather than through joint ventures.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to subsea production systems: subsea multiphase pump patent landscape, with the prior art for and against each one.
| Assignee | Co-assignee | Shared families |
|---|---|---|
| Framo Engineering | Navion | 12 |
| Framo Engineering | Kongsberg Offshore | 12 |
| Framo Engineering | Norsk Hydro | 4 |
| Framo Engineering | VALLAND ASMUND | 4 |
| Framo Engineering | KANSTAD STIG KARE | 4 |
| Framo Engineering | KANGAS NILS EGIL | 4 |
| Framo Engineering | BERLE ATLE | 4 |
| OneSubsea IP UK Limited | MOSCICKI MATTHEW R | 2 |
The ten identified co-assignee pairs cluster around a small set of Norwegian offshore engineering entities, with the strongest pairings sharing 12 records each. Most other assignees in the ranking file solo.
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to specific next steps depending on whether you are scoping freedom-to-operate, tracking a competitor, or looking for a filing gap.
Map the leader's full family tree
With 110 records from a single assignee, understanding which claims are core mechanism versus peripheral (sensors, controls, materials) changes where a design-around is realistic.
Explore assignee families in EurekaWatch the measurement-class gap
G01F and G01N sit under 4% of records each despite the pump's dependence on accurate flow and composition data — a candidate area for a first-mover filing.
Run a white-space search in EurekaTrack post-2024 publications as they land
Because publication lags filing by around 18 months, 2025-2026 records will keep arriving; re-check the trend before concluding the pullback has continued.
Set a filing alert in EurekaCommon questions about subsea multiphase pump patents
The dataset ranks 100 assignees by record count, and the leader holds 110 of the 744 records in scope, well ahead of the fifth-place company at 39. The top five assignees combined account for 41.5% of all records, and the top ten reach 59.8%, showing a field where a small group of subsea equipment and oilfield services companies file repeatedly while a long tail of other entrants file only a handful of records each. This concentration matters for freedom-to-operate work because a new filer is likely to run into the same few portfolios regardless of which specific claim they target.
Filing peaked in 2019 at 44 records and held near that level through 2021 at 25 records, then fell to 3 records by 2024, an 88% drop over that three-year span. That is a sharp pullback rather than a gradual taper, and it is worth investigating alongside industry capital-spending cycles rather than assuming a loss of technical interest. The 2025 and 2026 figures shown in any trend chart are still incomplete because patent publication typically lags filing by about 18 months, so recent years will fill in before the true trajectory is clear.
Earth and rock drilling (IPC class E21B) is tagged on 61.3% of the 744 records, reflecting how tightly subsea pump claims are bundled with wellbore and completion equipment. Non-positive-displacement pumping (F04D) follows at 26.6% and separation processes (B01D) at 15.9%, while positive-displacement pumps, pipeline transport and fuel-related classes each sit around 5-6%. Because a single record can carry several IPC classes, these shares add up to more than 100% and should be read as overlap density, not as a breakdown of a fixed total.
US20150315884A1, filed by Aker Subsea AS and published in November 2015, claims a subsea multiphase pumping system that pairs a pressure-boosting pump with an on-board separator and a power recovery turbine, routing separated liquid back into the pump inlet through that turbine. The architecture is a closed-loop energy recovery design rather than a simple boost-and-transport pump, which narrows the design-around options for anyone building a separator-integrated subsea pump. It is a useful reference point for scoping freedom-to-operate around integrated pump-separator systems specifically, rather than multiphase pumping in general.
Flow, level and volume measurement (G01F) and material analysis and testing (G01N) each appear in only 3.1-3.4% of the 744 records, far behind the mechanical core classes. Given how dependent multiphase pump performance is on accurate composition and flow data, this gap suggests sensing, condition monitoring and analytics claims around the pump are comparatively open relative to the pump mechanism itself. Co-assignee activity is also limited to ten identified pairs, so joint-venture filing structures in this space are underused compared with solo filing.
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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.