Thermal Spray Patents: Top Companies & Filing Trends 2026
- Filings peaked in 2017 at 351 and the ranked leader still holds 556 records against a fifth-place figure of 171 — concentration drops off fast below the top few names.
- C23C coating and surface deposition covers 33.1% of the 9,185 records in scope while turbine-related F01D claims sit at 9.8%, showing the field is anchored in core deposition chemistry rather than any single end application.
- Filings fell 21% from 2021 (267) to 2024 (211) the last year with a complete publication window — a real pullback, not an artefact of publication lag.
Filing growth compares 2021 (267 records) with 2024 (211) — 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 9,185 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What the thermal spray patent record actually covers
Thermal spray patenting spans coating composition, deposition process control and the downstream components that carry sprayed coatings — turbine parts, semiconductor process hardware and layered laminates. The search set combines thermal spray, thermal spray coating and spray deposition terms with process and performance concepts such as heat flux, thermal cycle, working fluid and surface morphology, which pulls in both materials-science filings and the mechanical systems that depend on the coating performing under thermal load.
Because a single filing can be tagged against several IPC subclasses — a coated turbine blade patent, for instance, sits under both C23C and F01D — the technology composition below sums to more than the record total. That overlap is itself informative: it shows how tightly coating chemistry claims are bundled with the hardware they protect.
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 9,185-record set: how filing activity has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses carry the claim density.
Filing trend, 2017–2026
Filings peaked at 351 in 2017. The 2021-to-2024 window, the most recent span with a complete publication record, shows a 21% decline (267 to 211). Years after 2024 are still filling in as publications catch up to filing dates, typically by around 18 months, so the apparent drop toward 2026 should not be read as the current trend.
Technology composition by IPC subclass
C23C (coating and surface deposition) accounts for 33.1% of the 9,185 records in scope, roughly three times the share of the next largest subclass, F01D (turbines), at 9.8%. B05D coating processes, B32B layered products, H01L semiconductor devices, C09D coatings/paints/inks, C22C alloys and B22F powder metallurgy each sit between 5.5% and 9.0%, indicating the claim space is distributed across materials formulation, process and end-component categories rather than concentrated in one.
Shares are the percentage of the 9,185 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Thermal Spray Patent Landscape with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about thermal spray patent landscape and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaA representative claim in the coating composition sub-area
Thermal spray composition and component made therewith
Thermal spray coating compositions, methods of using thermal spray coating compositions, and remanufactured components are disclosed herein. A thermal spray coating composition can include about 7% to about 9% by weight aluminum, about 5% to about 7% by weight silicon, about 1% to about 3% by weight manganese, about 1% to about 14% by weight copper, with a remaining balance of iron. The thermal spray coating composition can include about 2% to about 12% by weight copper.Filed by Caterpillar, published 2017-11-30 — illustrates the compositional-range claim style common to remanufacturing-oriented coating filings in this set.
View full record| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US5724187A | Electrochromic mirrors and devices | 1,480 |
| 2 | US5668663A | Electrochromic mirrors and devices | 1,259 |
| 3 | US20100277121A1 | Wireless energy transfer between a source and a vehicle | 1,008 |
| 4 | US20040053290A1 | Devices and methods for biochip multiplexing | 631 |
| 5 | US20100237709A1 | Resonator arrays for wireless energy transfer | 618 |
| 6 | US20120256494A1 | Tunable wireless energy transfer for medical applications | 611 |
| 7 | US6296909B1 | Method for thermally spraying crack-free mullite coatings on ceramic-based substrates | 559 |
| 8 | US20130057364A1 | Resonator enclosure | 557 |
| 9 | US20100308939A1 | Integrated resonator-shield structures | 542 |
| 10 | US20060165892A1 | Ruthenium containing layer deposition method | 535 |
Citation counts reflect age as much as importance — older records accumulate citations simply by being in the corpus longer, so treat this table as a map of influential prior art rather than a ranking of current relevance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Reading the concentration figures, the citation table and the co-assignee pairs together points to a field with a stable core chemistry and a small cluster of long-standing collaborators.
The top of the ranking holds a real but modest share
The five most active assignees combine for 14.9% of all 9,185 records in scope, and the top ten add up to 22.9%. That leaves the large majority of filings spread across a long tail of single- and few-filing entrants, which is typical of a mature process technology rather than one dominated by a handful of platform holders.
Filing activity concentrates in the US and Europe
The United States accounts for 3,479 records, ahead of the EPO at 1,595 and WIPO/PCT at 1,050, with Canada, India and Australia each in the low hundreds. That pattern points to where enforcement risk and prior art density are highest for any new filing strategy.
A small number of long-running co-filing relationships
Only 10 co-assignee pairs appear in the data, and the strongest link — between two Shell entities — reaches 21 shared records. This is a field where most assignees file independently rather than through joint development programmes.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to thermal spray patent landscape, with the prior art for and against each one.
Assignee landscape and where the claim space is still open
The ranked list covers 100 companies, counted by patent family, with a steep drop from the leader to the rest of the field.
One assignee sits well ahead of the field
The leading assignee holds 556 records, more than three times the fifth-place total of 171 and well above the tenth-place figure of 121. That gap suggests a long-established coating and component portfolio rather than a recent surge of filings.
A steep drop-off after the top few names
By tenth place the record count has fallen to 121, and the top ten together represent 22.9% of all 9,185 records in scope. Everything past that point is a long tail of narrower filers, many with momentum figures showing zero or declining activity in the latest year.
Recent-year activity has cooled across most named filers
Several assignees in the momentum data show flat or declining activity in the latest year, including drops to zero filings for some long-standing names. Given the roughly 18-month publication lag, this should be read as an early signal rather than confirmation that any individual programme has stopped.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Brilliant Light Power Inc | 3 | -40% |
| Applied Materials Inc | 1 | 0% |
| General Electric Co | 0 | -100% |
| United Technologies Corp | 0 | — |
| Shell Oil Co | 0 | — |
| PPG Industries Ohio Inc | 0 | -100% |
| Praxair S.T. Technology Inc | 0 | — |
| Shell Internationale Research Maatschappij BV | 0 | — |
Where to take this analysis next
The dataset points to a field with a dominant leader, a long tail, and technology composition spread across several IPC subclasses. Turning that into a filing or freedom-to-operate decision means going deeper on specific claims.
Map the compositional-range claims
Compositional-range claims like the Caterpillar representative record above are common in this set. Checking how tightly a target composition's weight-percent ranges overlap existing claims is a faster filter than reading full specifications one at a time.
Explore claim charting in EurekaTrack momentum by assignee, not just by rank
Record counts alone hide direction of travel. Cross-referencing the ranked leaders against their recent-year momentum shows which portfolios are still being built and which have gone quiet.
Set up assignee monitoring in EurekaCommon questions about thermal spray patenting
The ranked assignee list, covering 100 companies by patent family, shows one clear leader with 556 records, well ahead of the fifth-place holder at 171 and the tenth-place holder at 121. That said, the top ten combined account for only 22.9% of all 9,185 records in scope, so the field is far from a duopoly — most of the filing activity comes from a long tail of smaller filers. Anyone assessing competitive risk should look at both the concentrated top and the fragmented remainder, since freedom-to-operate exposure often sits in the tail rather than with the largest holder.
Filings peaked in 2017 at 351 and the most recent complete window, 2021 to 2024, shows a 21% decline from 267 to 211. Years after 2024 appear lower still in the raw counts, but that is expected: publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, so the newest years are always undercounted at the point of any data pull. The honest read is a real pullback through 2024, with the trend for 2025 onward not yet fully visible.
C23C, covering coating and surface deposition, is the largest single subclass at 33.1% of the 9,185 records in scope. F01D (turbines), B05D (coating processes), B32B (layered products), H01L (semiconductor devices), C09D (coatings, paints and inks), C22C (alloys) and B22F (powder metallurgy) each account for between roughly 5.5% and 9.8% of records. Because a single filing can carry several IPC tags, these shares add up to more than 100%, reflecting how often coating chemistry claims are bundled with the specific hardware or process they support.
The United States is the largest receiving office in this dataset with 3,479 records, followed by the European Patent Office at 1,595 and WIPO under the PCT route at 1,050. Canada, India and Australia each sit in the low hundreds. This distribution indicates that the US and Europe carry the densest prior art and the highest enforcement exposure for new filings in this space, with PCT filings serving as the main gateway to broader international coverage.
US20170342538A1, assigned to Caterpillar and published in November 2017, claims thermal spray coating compositions defined by weight-percent ranges for aluminum, silicon, manganese and copper with an iron balance, along with methods of use and remanufactured components made with them. It is a representative example of the compositional-range claim style that appears widely in this corpus, where protection is built around numeric ranges for alloying elements rather than a single fixed formula. Anyone formulating a similar iron-based thermal spray powder should check whether their target composition falls inside these disclosed ranges before finalizing a formulation.
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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.