Surgical Smoke Evacuation Patents: Who Leads, Where Gaps Are 2026
Surgical smoke evacuation patents: mapping the filers, the filing surge and the gaps still open
86.7% of all 45 records sit with just five assignees, so the field is concentrated at the top rather than fragmented across many small filers. Filings sat at zero through the earlier years covered, then rose to a peak of 8 in 2024 — a +700% increase from the single 2021 filing. Because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, the apparent softness in 2025 and 2026 reflects the reporting lag, not a slowdown; 2024 is the most recent year the trend can be read as complete.
- 1FISHER & PAYKEL HEALTHCARE LTD17
- 2ACUDERM9
- 3STRYKER CORP5
- 4COVIDIEN LP5
- 5CILAG GMBH INTERNATIONAL3
See the full surgical smoke evacuation and safety 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 holds the most patents in surgical smoke evacuation?
One assignee leads the field with 17 of the 45 records in scope, well ahead of the fifth-ranked filer’s 3 records. The top five assignees together account for 86.7% of all records, and the top ten cover the full set. This means the field is concentrated among a small group rather than spread evenly across many companies, so competitive tracking should focus on that ranked group rather than trying to monitor a long tail that does not really exist here.
Is surgical smoke evacuation patent filing growing or slowing down?
Filing activity grew sharply in recent years, moving from a single filing in 2021 to a peak of 8 in 2024, a +700% increase over that span. Because patent publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the lower counts shown for 2025 and 2026 in this dataset reflect that reporting delay rather than an actual drop in filing activity. Treat 2024 as the last year the trend can be read as complete.
What are the main patent classes covering surgical smoke evacuation?
The dominant class is A61B (diagnosis and surgery), covering 86.7% of the 45 records, followed by A61M (devices for body fluids) at 37.8%. Smaller but still present classes include G01F (flow, level and volume measuring) and G08B (signalling and alarm systems), each at 15.6%, along with A61L (sterilising and disinfecting) at 8.9%. Since a single record can carry multiple classes, these shares add up to more than 100% and should be read individually against the 45-record total, not summed.
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 Surgical Smoke Evacuation and Safety 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.