Traffic Collision Avoidance Patents: Who Leads, Trends 2026
- 54.6% concentration. The top 5 assignees hold 534 of 978 records in scope — over half the field sits with a handful of avionics and defense majors.
- Filings down 83% since the 2021 peak. From 30 records in 2021 to 5 in 2024 (the last complete year), though publication lag means 2025-2026 figures are still filling in.
- G08G and G01S dominate together. 60.1% of records touch traffic control systems (G08G) and 50.9% touch radar/positioning (G01S) — the two classes overlap heavily rather than sitting apart.
Filing growth compares 2021 (30 records) with 2024 (5) — 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 978 records in scope (CR5), not by the ranked leaders only.
What this dataset covers
This landscape maps 978 published records filed between 2015 and 2026 that reference airborne collision avoidance, resolution advisory logic, traffic alerting, Mode S transponder surveillance and related sense-reversal or vertical-separation techniques. The scope spans cockpit-display alerting systems built on TCAS-style architectures as well as adjacent radar, positioning and hybrid surveillance filings that support them. Because publication lags filing by roughly eighteen months, the most recent one to two years in any trend chart understate real filing activity.
The record set is dominated by a small number of avionics and aerospace-defense filers, with a long tail of single or low-frequency filers behind them. Reading the concentration alongside the IPC composition below shows where claim space is dense and where it is comparatively open.
Filing trends and technology composition
The trend line and IPC breakdown below are drawn from the same 978-record set described above, using the exact figures returned by the search.
Filing trend: rapid rise, sharp pullback
Filings rose from 22 records in 2017 to a peak of 31 in 2018, then declined through the early 2020s. The clearest complete-year comparison is 2021 (30 records) against 2024 (5 records), an 83% drop over three years. Treat 2025 and 2026 as incomplete rather than as confirmation the field has gone quiet.
Technology composition: two classes carry most of the field
G08G (traffic control systems) appears in 60.1% of the 978 records and G01S (radar, sonar & positioning) in 50.9%, and because records can carry multiple classes these two overlap substantially. G01C (navigation/gyroscopes, 15.1%), B64D (aircraft equipment, 12.4%) and the smaller wireless and data-processing classes (H04B, H04W, G06F) show where collision-avoidance filings connect to broader connectivity and processing claims.
Shares are the percentage of the 978 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Traffic Collision Avoidance Systems with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about traffic collision avoidance systems and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaMost-cited records and a representative claim
US6459411B2 — Close/intra-formation positioning collision avoidance system and method
A passive Traffic Alert and Collision Avoidance System (TCAS) and method based on receiving and processing Mode-S transponder messages without the TCAS computer having to interrogate the transponders of aircraft flying in formation. A TCAS computer and Mode-S transponder provide distributed intra-formation control among multiple cells of aircraft flying in formation or close-in, using ADS-B GPS squitter data relayed through the Mode-S transponder rather than active interrogation.Filed by L-3 Communications Corporation, granted 2002-10-01.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US20030093187A1 | PFN/TRAC systemTM FAA upgrades for accountable remote and robotics control to stop the unauthorized use of ai… | 977 |
| 2 | US20050187677A1 | PFN/TRAC systemTM FAA upgrades for accountable remote and robotics control to stop the unauthorized use of ai… | 595 |
| 3 | US6965816B2 | PFN/TRAC system FAA upgrades for accountable remote and robotics control to stop the unauthorized use of airc… | 489 |
| 4 | US20100292871A1 | Adaptive surveillance and guidance system for vehicle collision avoidance and interception | 425 |
| 5 | US6314366B1 | Satellite based collision avoidance system | 400 |
| 6 | US20030132860A1 | Interface for visual cueing and control for tactical flightpath management | 341 |
| 7 | US6385513B1 | Satellite emergency voice/data downlink | 323 |
| 8 | US20050156777A1 | Integrated traffic surveillance apparatus | 270 |
| 9 | US7443334B2 | Collision alerting and avoidance system | 263 |
| 10 | US20090027253A1 | Collision and conflict avoidance system for autonomous unmanned air vehicles (UAVs) | 262 |
Citation counts inside a searched corpus favor older filings that have had more time to accumulate citations — read them as a signal of influence on the field, not as a measure of current commercial relevance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Three patterns stand out once the ranking, trend and IPC data are read together.
Half the field sits with a handful of filers
The top 5 assignees combine for 534 of 978 records, and the top 10 extend that to 66.4%. A leader at 248 records sits well ahead of fifth place at 40, meaning the drop-off after the top tier is steep rather than gradual.
Filing volume has pulled back sharply from its peak
Filings peaked at 31 records in 2018 and held near 30 through 2021 before falling to 5 by 2024, the last year that can be treated as complete. Recent-year momentum by assignee shows several leading filers at zero in the latest tracked year, consistent with the broader pullback rather than isolated to one company.
Traffic control and radar classes overlap heavily
G08G and G01S together cover most of the corpus, and their overlap suggests collision-avoidance claims are typically drafted spanning both surveillance logic and traffic-control response rather than either alone. Smaller classes like H04W (3.5%) and H04B (4.2%) point to where wireless links support but do not define these systems.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to traffic collision avoidance systems, with the prior art for and against each one.
Who holds the ground, and where it is open
The assignee ranking covers 100 companies counted by record; it is not a top-50 or top-100 cut, it is the full list the data endpoint returns.
One filer sits well clear of the rest
The leading assignee's 248 records are close to half of the combined top-5 total of 534, indicating a filer that has treated collision-avoidance claim space as core IP rather than a peripheral filing area.
A sharp step down after the leader
Fifth place holds 40 records and tenth place 18 — a gap that shows the field's mid-tier filers are still active but filing at a fraction of the leader's rate, leaving room for a fast follower to build a defensible position without matching the leader's volume.
Co-filing is concentrated around one company's inventors
The strongest co-assignee pairs all involve the same organization paired with named individual inventors, at 4-6 shared records each, suggesting internal inventor teams rather than cross-company joint filings dominate the collaboration signal in this dataset.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Honeywell International Inc | 0 | -100% |
| AVIATION COMMUNICATION & SURVEILLANCE SYSTEMS LLC | 0 | — |
| Thales SA | 0 | — |
| The Boeing Co | 0 | — |
| Qualcomm Inc | 0 | — |
| Airbus Defence & Space GmbH | 0 | — |
| AIRBUS FRANCE | 0 | — |
| Flight Safety Technologies Inc | 0 | — |
Where to take this next
The landscape narrows the question from a whole technology field to a small number of specific claim positions and filers worth a closer look.
Map the leader's claim boundaries
With 248 records the leading assignee's portfolio is large enough that a subclass-level breakdown will show which sub-areas are locked up and which are thin, informing where a new filing has room.
Explore assignee portfolios in EurekaCheck the white-space chips against live filings
Sub-areas like hybrid surveillance fusion or sense-reversal logic look under-claimed in this dataset; a claim-chart search against recent filings confirms whether that gap is still open.
Run a white-space search in EurekaWatch for the 2025-2026 correction
Because publication lag understates the last one to two years, re-running this trend in six to twelve months will show whether the 2021-2024 decline continues or was a filing-cycle dip.
Track filing trends in EurekaCommon questions on traffic collision avoidance patents
The dataset's leading assignee holds 248 of the 978 records in scope, well ahead of the fifth-ranked filer at 40 and the tenth at 18. The top 5 assignees combined account for 54.6% of all records, and the top 10 for 66.4%, so the field is concentrated at the top with a long tail of smaller filers behind it. That concentration pattern is typical of avionics safety systems, where a small number of established suppliers file continuation and improvement patents around a core architecture over many years.
Filings fell from 30 records in 2021 to 5 in 2024, an 83% drop over that complete-year span, following a peak of 31 records in 2018. This could reflect a maturing core architecture where fewer new claims are needed, consolidation among the leading filers, or a shift in R&D toward adjacent areas like UAS traffic management. It is worth noting that 2025 and 2026 figures are still incomplete due to the roughly 18-month lag between filing and publication, so the most recent apparent decline should not be read as the final word.
The two largest IPC classes are G08G (traffic control systems), appearing in 60.1% of the 978 records, and G01S (radar, sonar and positioning), appearing in 50.9%. Because a single patent can carry multiple classification codes, these two overlap substantially, indicating most filings combine surveillance sensing with traffic-control decision logic rather than treating them as separate inventions. Smaller but notable classes include G01C (navigation, 15.1%) and B64D (aircraft equipment, 12.4%), showing links to broader avionics and navigation claims.
US6459411B2, assigned to L-3 Communications Corporation and granted in 2002, covers a passive Traffic Alert and Collision Avoidance System that processes Mode-S transponder messages without the TCAS computer having to actively interrogate other aircraft's transponders. It specifically addresses intra-formation and close-in collision avoidance using ADS-B GPS squitter data relayed through the Mode-S transponder. Anyone designing a passive, non-interrogating collision-avoidance scheme for formation or close-proximity flight should review this claim scope closely before finalizing an architecture.
Sub-areas such as hybrid surveillance fusion logic, sense-reversal decision algorithms, passive Mode-S squitter relay techniques, intra-formation closure-rate estimation and vertical-separation alerting adapted for uncrewed aircraft show comparatively lighter filing density than the dominant G08G/G01S core. These are not confirmed gaps without a fresh claim-chart search, but they sit adjacent to heavily filed territory and are worth checking against the most recent filings before committing R&D or drafting resources to that direction.
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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.