Thermal Barrier Coatings Patents: Who Leads, Filing Trends 2026
- Filing has declined since its 2018 peak of 78, with the 2022 midpoint at 37 — the claim space built up over the last decade is now being consolidated rather than expanded.
- Momentum has stalled across every major assignee, with GE, Honeywell and both Rolls-Royce entities showing 0 filings and -100% YoY in the most recent year of the dataset.
- C23C coating claims dominate at 1,860 of 2,137 records, while F23R combustion-chamber integration (105) and B23P metalworking process claims (77) remain comparatively thin.
Filing growth compares 2021 (53 records) with 2024 (11) — 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 2,137 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this dataset covers
This landscape draws on 2,137 patent families published between 2015 and mid-2026, filtered to documents claiming a thermal barrier coating system, bond coat, or thermally grown oxide behaviour under CMAS attack, spallation or electron beam PVD deposition, and classified under C23C, C23C28 or F01D5. It is a coatings-and-turbine-hardware crossover: the majority of records sit in coating deposition classes, but over 1,300 also carry a turbine-component classification, meaning most applicants are claiming the coating as installed on a specific blade, vane or combustor part rather than as a standalone material.
Because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the last one to two years in any trend chart will read lower than the true filing rate once those applications publish. That lag does not explain a decline stretching back to a 2018 peak, however — the flattening in this dataset reflects filing behaviour, not a reporting artefact.
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Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 2,137-family dataset: how filing volume has moved year over year, and how those families distribute across the IPC subclasses that make up a TBC system.
A decade of rise and plateau
Filings rose from 60 in 2017 to a peak of 78 in 2018, then eased back through the 2022 midpoint of 37 and continued down toward single digits by 2026 — consistent with a technology area where the core claim territory was staked out early and new entrants now face dense prior art.
Coating claims outweigh everything else
C23C (coating and surface deposition) accounts for 1,860 of the 2,137 records, well ahead of F01D turbine hardware (1,302) and C04B ceramics (375). The smaller counts in F23R combustion chambers (105) and B23P metalworking (77) mark where integration- and process-level claims are comparatively sparse.
Shares are the percentage of the 2,137 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Thermal Barrier Coatings for Gas Turbines with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about thermal barrier coatings for gas turbines and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaThe foundational filings this field cites back to
Rare-earth doped bond coat for thermally grown oxide luminescence sensing
A thermal barrier coated turbine component carries a metallic bond coat doped with rare-earth luminescent ions. As the thermally grown oxide (TGO) layer forms at the bond coat/top coat interface, dopant ions migrate into it, enabling real-time phosphor thermometry — optical temperature sensing of the TGO layer itself rather than of the component surface.Filed by University of Central Florida Research Foundation, published 2021-06-17.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US20090324989A1 | Multilayer thermal barrier coating | 443 |
| 2 | US5514482A | Thermal barrier coating system for superalloy components | 277 |
| 3 | US5683825A | Thermal barrier coating resistant to erosion and impact by particulate matter | 234 |
| 4 | US6177200B1 | Thermal barrier coating systems and materials | 233 |
| 5 | US6284323B1 | Thermal barrier coating systems and materials | 232 |
| 6 | US6117560A | Thermal barrier coating systems and materials | 230 |
| 7 | US6102656A | Segmented abradable ceramic coating | 230 |
| 8 | US5716720A | Thermal barrier coating system with intermediate phase bondcoat | 220 |
| 9 | US6465090B1 | Protective coating for thermal barrier coatings and coating method therefor | 219 |
| 10 | US5705231A | Method of producing a segmented abradable ceramic coating system | 218 |
Citation counts accumulate over time and favour older filings; treat this table as a map of foundational influence, not of which claims are commercially active today.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Four read-throughs from the trend, classification and citation data above.
Growth phase has closed
The jump from 60 filings in 2017 to a peak of 78 in 2018 marked an active buildout period. The steady decline since — through 37 at the 2022 midpoint and down toward the low single digits by 2026 — indicates applicants have largely staked their positions rather than continuing to expand claim territory.
Coating claims crowd the top classification
Nearly nine in ten records touch C23C, the coating and surface deposition subclass, confirming this is fundamentally a materials and deposition-process field even though most filings also name a turbine application.
Incumbents have gone quiet at once
GE, Honeywell and both Rolls-Royce entities each show zero filings and a -100% year-on-year change in the latest period. A simultaneous pullback across multiple large filers this pronounced usually signals either a maturing claim base or a reporting lag rather than a genuine collapse in R&D.
A handful of 1990s-2000s filings anchor the field
The most-cited records in this dataset date to the multilayer and erosion-resistant TBC systems era; their citation counts (up to 443) reflect decades of accumulation and mark foundational prior art that later filings must design around, not current competitive activity.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to thermal barrier coatings for gas turbines, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who holds the claim space
Filing here concentrates among a small group of turbine OEMs and their coating-services affiliates, several of which also appear as co-assignee pairs — a sign of joint filings between parent and subsidiary or between OEM and licensed coating applicator.
OEM–applicator pairing dominates joint filings
The strongest co-assignee link in this dataset pairs a turbine OEM with an independent coating applicator at 41 shared families, well ahead of the next-strongest pairs. That pattern points to coordinated IP strategy between the component designer and the shop actually applying the coating.
Every major incumbent shows zero recent filings
GE, United Technologies, Honeywell, Siemens and both Rolls-Royce entities all register zero filings in the latest tracked year. Given the ~18-month publication lag, some of this is likely unpublished pipeline rather than an actual freeze on R&D.
US and European filings run near parity
The United States (743) and the EPO (737) receive almost identical volumes, with WIPO PCT filings (168) a distant third — suggesting most applicants pursue direct national/regional protection in the two largest turbine markets rather than routing everything through PCT first.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| General Electric Company | 0 | -100% |
| United Technologies Corporation | 0 | — |
| Honeywell International Inc. | 0 | -100% |
| Siemens AG | 0 | — |
| Rolls-Royce plc | 0 | -100% |
| Rolls-Royce Corporation | 0 | — |
| Raytheon Technologies Corporation | 0 | -100% |
| CHROMALLOY UK | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to a mature core and a thinner set of adjacent claims. Two directions make sense from here.
Map freedom-to-operate against the top-cited patents
The five most-cited records anchor decades of prior art in multilayer and erosion-resistant TBC systems. Any new bond coat or top coat composition claim should be checked against these before drafting.
Explore prior art in EurekaTrack whether the assignee pullback is real or a lag artefact
Zero recent filings across every major incumbent is a striking signal. Re-running this trend in twelve months, once the publication lag clears, will show whether it reflects a genuine slowdown or a temporary gap.
Set up monitoring in EurekaCommon questions about thermal barrier coating patents
Filing in this space concentrates among turbine OEMs and their affiliated coating-services companies, including GE, United Technologies, Honeywell, Siemens and the Rolls-Royce group of entities. Several of these appear as co-assignees on the same families, most notably a turbine OEM paired with an independent coating applicator across 41 shared families — the strongest joint-filing link in the dataset. That pairing pattern suggests IP strategy is coordinated between the component designer and the shop that actually applies the coating, rather than each filing independently.
No — filing peaked at 78 families in 2018, up from 60 in 2017, and has declined steadily since, reaching 37 at the 2022 midpoint and falling further toward the most recent tracked year. This flattening pattern, combined with a simultaneous pullback to zero recent filings across every major incumbent, points to a technology area where core claim territory was staked out early. Some of the most recent decline is likely understated because of the roughly 18-month lag between filing and publication, but the multi-year downward trend predates that effect.
The bond coat is the metallic layer applied directly to the superalloy substrate, and its main patent-relevant function is controlling the thermally grown oxide (TGO) that forms at its interface with the ceramic top coat — TGO growth and spallation resistance are heavily claimed themes in this dataset. The top coat is the ceramic layer, typically yttria-stabilized zirconia, that provides the actual thermal insulation and is the layer most exposed to CMAS (calcium-magnesium-aluminosilicate) attack from ingested particulates. Most granted claims in this field bundle both layers into a single system claim rather than claiming either layer in isolation, which is why C23C coating classifications dominate the IPC composition even though the underlying invention is often about the bond coat/TGO interface.
CMAS refers to calcium-magnesium-aluminosilicate deposits that form when a turbine ingests sand, volcanic ash or other silicate debris; at high operating temperatures these deposits melt and infiltrate the porous ceramic top coat, causing it to lose strain tolerance and spall off. Patents claiming CMAS resistance typically cover modified top coat chemistries, dense outer layers, or reactive additives designed to react with molten CMAS and block further infiltration. Within this dataset, CMAS-resistant chemistry sits toward the thinner edge of the classification data relative to the dominant multilayer and erosion-resistant coating claims, making it one of the more open sub-areas for new filings.
The dataset shows GE, Honeywell, Siemens and both Rolls-Royce entities each recording zero filings and a -100% year-on-year change in the most recent tracked year. Part of this is a data artefact: publication typically lags actual filing by around 18 months, so the newest applications from these firms may simply not be published yet. That said, the decline is not confined to the last year alone — filing volume across the whole field has been easing since the 2018 peak, so a genuine slowdown in new claim activity, on top of the reporting lag, is a reasonable reading of the data.
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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.