Tungsten & Molybdenum Extraction Patents: Leaders & Trends 2026
Tungsten and Molybdenum Extraction Patents: Who Leads and Where Filings Are Heading
Concentrated at the top. The five leading assignees hold 31.8% of all 1,589 records in scope, and the top ten hold 44.1% — this field is not a level playing field. Filings rose from 32 in 2017 to a peak of 54 in 2021, then fell to 21 by 2024 — a 61% decline over that three-year window. 2025 and 2026 figures are still low because publication lags filing by roughly 18 months; they should not be read as a continuing decline yet.
- 1NIPPON SHOKUBAI CO LTD16.7%
- 2MITSUBISHI CHEM CORP4.6%
- 3MITSUBISHI HEAVY IND LTD4.4%
- 4BABCOCK HITACHI KK3.3%
- 5BASF SE2.7%
See the full tungsten and molybdenum extraction 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 are the leading patent holders in tungsten and molybdenum extraction?
Filing in this field is concentrated: the top five assignees together hold 31.8% of the 1,589 records in scope, and the top ten hold 44.1%. The single top-ranked assignee alone holds 266 records, well ahead of the fifth-placed holder at 43 and the tenth-placed holder at 35. This steep drop-off means competitive intelligence work should treat the leader’s portfolio as a distinct block rather than assume filings are evenly spread across the ranked field.
Is patent filing in this area still growing?
No — filing activity peaked in 2021 at 54 records and fell to 21 by 2024, a 61% decline over that span. The most recent one to two years in the dataset will always look artificially low because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, so 2025-2026 figures should not yet be read as continued decline. Taken together, the trend through the last complete year points to a field past its most active filing window rather than one still accelerating.
What technology areas dominate tungsten and molybdenum extraction patents?
Chemical and physical process claims under IPC class B01J cover 68.2% of the 1,589 records, making catalysis the single largest technology bucket. Organic chemistry classes C07C (43.3%) and C07B (21.7%) also appear frequently, reflecting how much of this corpus concerns catalyst manufacture rather than raw ore processing. Pure separation processes (B01D) appear in only 14.7% of records, and battery-related filings (H01M) in just 4.3%, indicating those are comparatively less-crowded areas of claim space.
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 Tungsten and Molybdenum Extraction 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.