Trapped Ion Patents: Who Leads, Where the Gaps Are 2026
- Filing peaked in 2020 at 8 records and has not returned to that level since, including a flat 2022 — a pattern worth checking against R&D roadmaps before assuming steady growth.
- Five assignees hold the entire ranked field with the leader at 8 records and the fifth-place holder at just 1, so most of the claim space sits with a small group of filers.
- G06N (AI-adjacent computing) appears in 76.9% of the 13 records far ahead of any hardware-specific class, suggesting control and compute claims are more crowded than the physical trap hardware itself.
Filing growth compares 2021 (3 records) with 2024 (1) — 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.
What this dataset covers
This landscape draws on 13 published records matching trapped ion quantum computer architectures, ion shuttling, and surface ion trap chips, filtered to documents that also address gate fidelity, shuttling heating, reordering, photonic interconnects, laser delivery, beam addressing, vacuum systems, or cryogenic packaging. The scope runs from 2015 to a 2026-07-31 cut-off, and because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, the most recent year is understated by design, not by a gap in coverage.
The field is small and concentrated: five assignees account for the entire ranked set, receiving offices skew toward the United States and Europe, and citation activity clusters around a handful of switching-apparatus and laser-delivery filings. That combination points to a technology still consolidating around a few architectural bets rather than one that has broadened out across many independent filers.
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 13-record dataset: how filings have moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses the claims actually sit in.
Filing trend, 2017-2026
Filings rose to a peak of 8 in 2020, then fell back; the 2022 midpoint reads 0, and the partial-year 2026 figure should be read as a floor rather than a final count given the usual 18-month publication lag.
IPC subclass distribution (share of 13 records)
G06N covers 76.9% of records, well ahead of the semiconductor-device classes H01L and H10D at 23.1% each; because records can carry multiple IPC codes, these shares sum to more than 100% and should be read against the 13-record total, not against each other as a pie.
Shares are the percentage of the 13 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Go deeper on Trapped Ion Architecture and Ion Transport with Eureka
This page is one run against one query. Ask Eureka your own question about trapped ion architecture and ion transport and every answer comes back with the patent numbers behind it.
Try EurekaMost-cited prior art in this set
Compact laser delivery to a qubit ion and a sympathetic cooling ion in a trapped ion quantum computer
The filing describes a gate laser system in which two lasers, frequency-locked to a frequency comb, deliver beams to a qubit ion within an ion trap to implement a gate, alongside a separate management scheme for qubit and sympathetic-cooling ion beams.US12079692B2, Quantinuum LLC, published 2024-09-03.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US20220037313A1 | Ion trap apparatus with integrated switching apparatus | 26 |
| 2 | US11056332B1 | Microfabricated ion trap chip with in situ radio-frequency sensing | 17 |
| 3 | US20210075184A1 | Compact laser delivery to atomic systems | 6 |
| 4 | US11876092B2 | Ion trap apparatus with integrated switching apparatus | 3 |
| 5 | WO2024151161A1 | Quantum logic gate for a trapped ion quantum computer | 2 |
| 6 | AU2020277183A1 | Apparatuses, systems, and methods for ion traps | 2 |
| 7 | US12079692B2 | Compact laser delivery to a qubit ion and a sympathetic cooling ion in a trapped ion quantum computer | 2 |
| 8 | EP4033528A1 | Ion trap apparatus with integrated switching apparatus | 1 |
Citation counts inside a searched corpus favour older filings; treat this as a signal of influence within the dataset, not a ranking of current technical importance.
Publication numbers are shown where the record carries one (8 of 8 rows); clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Three read-outs from the filing trend, the IPC mix, and the receiving-office split that matter for anyone deciding where to file or partner next.
Activity has not been steady
The trend runs from 0 in 2017 to a peak of 8 in 2020, then back to 0 by the 2022 midpoint. A single strong year driving most of the record count is a different story than gradual, compounding growth, and it changes how much weight the peak should carry in a competitive read.
Control and compute claims dominate
G06N (AI-adjacent computing constructs) touches more than three-quarters of the 13 records, while the semiconductor hardware classes H01L and H10D each sit at 23.1%. Optical control (G02F), lasers (H01S) and pulse technique (H03K) each cover 15.4%, pointing to real but thinner activity around the physical delivery and control layers.
Filing is US- and Europe-led
The United States leads with 5 filings, followed by the EPO with 3 and WIPO/PCT with 2; Austria, Australia and Germany each hold 1. That spread is narrow enough that a single national filing decision by one of the ranked assignees can visibly shift the jurisdictional balance.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to trapped ion architecture and ion transport, with the prior art for and against each one.
The ranked assignees
Five companies make up the entire ranking this dataset returns — not a top-50 or top-100 cut, but the full set of assignees with published records in scope. The leader holds 8 records; the fifth-place holder holds 1.
One assignee holds most of the ranked volume
The leading assignee's 8 records against a fifth-place count of 1 shows a steep drop-off rather than a gradual tail, which is unusual for a five-company ranking and worth confirming against the assignee's own roadmap disclosures.
Filing is largely independent
Only one co-assignee pairing appears in the dataset, linking the two largest filers. Beyond that pair, the remaining assignees file solo, which is consistent with a field still organised around a few vertically integrated programmes rather than joint ventures.
Momentum has stalled across the board
Every ranked assignee shows 0 filings in the latest tracked year, including a -100% year-on-year figure for the smallest filer. Given the 18-month publication lag, this understates true recent activity, but it also means no assignee is currently showing visible acceleration in the public record.
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Honeywell International Inc. | 0 | — |
| Quantinuum LLC | 0 | — |
| University of Amsterdam | 0 | — |
| Sandia National Technologies and Engineering Solutions | 0 | — |
| KIPU QUANTUM GMBH | 0 | -100% |
Where to take this
A landscape like this is a starting point for scoping, not a substitute for a formal freedom-to-operate check on any specific claim.
Map claims against your own architecture
Run your specific trap geometry, laser delivery scheme, or shuttling approach against the most-cited filings here to see which claim elements actually overlap before committing engineering time.
Explore in EurekaTrack the assignees showing zero recent momentum
A stalled filing pace across all five ranked assignees can mean consolidation, trade-secret strategy, or a pending wave once the 18-month publication lag clears — worth monitoring rather than assuming the field has gone quiet.
Set up monitoring in EurekaCommon questions
Within this 13-record dataset, five assignees make up the entire ranked field, with the leading company holding 8 records and the fifth-place holder holding just 1. That is a steep concentration for a five-company list, meaning a small number of organisations control most of the documented claim space around ion trap architecture and ion transport in this scope. It does not mean these are the only companies active in trapped ion quantum computing generally, only the ones with published records matching this specific search scope and date range.
The filing trend peaked at 8 records in 2020 and had fallen back to 0 by the 2022 midpoint, which reads as flat-to-declining rather than steady growth. Because publication typically lags actual filing by around 18 months, the most recent years in any such trend are understated, so recent quiet years should not be read as a definitive slowdown in R&D activity. A more reliable read comes from re-checking the trend a year or two after each cut-off date.
G06N, the IPC subclass covering AI-model-adjacent computing constructs, appears in 76.9% of the 13 records in scope, well ahead of the semiconductor hardware classes H01L and H10D at 23.1% each. Optical control, laser subsystems and pulse-technique classes each sit around 15.4%. Since records can carry multiple IPC codes, this points to control and compute logic being more heavily claimed than the physical trap hardware or laser delivery layers, which show thinner but still present activity.
US12079692B2, assigned to Quantinuum and published 2024-09-03, describes a gate laser system where two lasers are frequency-locked to a frequency comb and directed at a qubit ion within an ion trap to perform a gate, along with a related scheme for managing beams to both a qubit ion and a sympathetic cooling ion. It is a laser-delivery and beam-management filing rather than a claim over the trap chip itself. Anyone building a competing gate laser architecture for trapped ion systems should read its specific claim language on frequency-locking and beam-targeting closely rather than assuming it only covers general laser delivery.
Based on the IPC and citation data here, sub-areas like sympathetic-cooling beam sequencing, in-situ RF sensing on trap chips, and cryogenic packaging for surface traps show thinner coverage than the dominant compute and control classes. That does not mean these areas are unclaimed, but the density is visibly lower than in G06N-heavy filings. A first claim in one of these branches would need to specifically avoid the frequency-locking and switching-apparatus language already established by the most-cited records in this set.
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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.