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Run your analysis now →https://www.patsnap.com/resources/blog/rd-blog/variable-refrigerant-flow-system-air-handling-patent-landscape/ · Patsnap · data cut-off 2026-07-31 · downloaded from the live page
Patent Landscape · HVAC & Thermal SystemsVariable Refrigerant Flow System Air Handling: Where the Patents Actually Sit
- A 14-family field, all filed through the US. Every record in this dataset routes through the United States receiving office, with no counterpart filings tracked elsewhere in the corpus.
- Filing peaked in 2023 at three families, then went quiet. A zero-filing year at the 2022 midpoint and no activity from tracked assignees in the latest year point to a field that has not sustained early momentum.
- Volume-modulating damper claims dominate the citation table. US9625184B2 and the related US11131467B2 / US20200326082A1 family concentrate the citations, meaning new ducted-zone airflow control designs need to clear that prior art first.
14
Published Records
-50%
3-Yr Growth (lag-adjusted)
US
Leading Jurisdiction
2023
Peak Filing Year
Published byPatsnap Research··7 min readSourced from Patsnap Eureka
Overview
What this dataset covers
This landscape tracks patent families at the intersection of variable refrigerant flow (VRF) outdoor systems and the indoor air-handling hardware that distributes conditioned air to ducted zones — fan coil units, volume-modulating dampers and airflow control logic. The search combines VRF terminology with air-handling-specific claim language and IPC codes for air conditioning, domestic heating and refrigeration equipment (F24F, F24D, F25B).
The corpus is small — 14 published families — and every one of them was filed through the United States receiving office. That is a narrow lens: it reflects US prosecution activity in ducted VRF air handling specifically, not global VRF filing overall, which is dominated by much larger corpora from Japanese and Chinese HVAC manufacturers outside this claim scope.
Filing activity, 2017-2026
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee ranking and totals. Derived from a Patsnap search on Variable Refrigerant Flow System Air Handling covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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The Data
Filing trend and technology composition
Publication counts for the most recent year or two always understate real filing activity, since patent applications typically publish around 18 months after they are filed. Read the tail of any trend chart with that lag in mind.
A short, front-loaded filing curve
Activity opens in 2017, builds unevenly, and peaks at three families in 2023 before dropping off. A flat zero at the 2022 midpoint interrupts any read of steady growth, and no tracked assignee shows filings in the latest year — consistent with either a genuine slowdown or simply un-published recent applications.
Air conditioning claims anchor the field, heating and refrigeration overlap it
F24F (air conditioning and ventilation) appears in 11 of the 14 records, confirming that ducted air-handling control is the primary claim territory. F24D (domestic heating, 5 records) and F25B (refrigeration and heat pumps, 4 records) overlap heavily, reflecting that VRF systems are inherently dual-mode heating/cooling architectures and that damper or valve claims are frequently drafted to cover both functions.
Shares are the percentage of the 14 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Filing trend and technology composition. Derived from a Patsnap search on Variable Refrigerant Flow System Air Handling covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.
Go deeper on Variable Refrigerant Flow System Air Handling with Eureka
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The most-cited records in this corpus
Representative Filing
US11131467B2 — HVAC system with volume modulating valve
OSHEROFF, GENE
An HVAC system pairs a VRF outdoor compressor unit with an indoor fan coil unit that supplies ducted air to multiple zones. Each zone carries a volume-modulating air damper holding a predetermined airflow volume; as zones open and close, duct pressure shifts, and the dampers compensate to keep delivered volume constant per zone.Filed by Osheroff, Gene; granted 2021-09-28. Sits alongside the closely related US9625184B2 and US20200326082A1 as the citation anchors of this dataset.
Citation leaders
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US9625184B2 | Multi-split HVAC system | 11 |
| 2 | US20200326082A1 | HVAC System With Volume Modulating Valve | 7 |
| 3 | US20220010978A1 | Integrated space conditioning and water heating/cooling systems and methods thereto | 4 |
| 4 | US11131467B2 | HVAC system with volume modulating valve | 4 |
| 5 | US20170219255A1 | Multi-Split HVAC System | 4 |
| 6 | US20190093928A1 | Multi-Split HVAC System | 1 |
Citation counts here reflect influence within this searched corpus and skew toward older filings; a low count on a recent family is not evidence that it is unimportant.
Publication numbers are shown where the record carries one (6 of 6 rows); clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Citation counts and representative records. Derived from a Patsnap search on Variable Refrigerant Flow System Air Handling covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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What the numbers mean for a filing decision
Three patterns stand out once family counts, IPC composition and citation concentration are put side by side.
Filing Momentum
2023 = 3 filings
peak year
Momentum peaked, then stalled
The trend line rises unevenly to a peak of three families in 2023, after sitting at zero in 2022. No tracked assignee logged a filing in the latest year, which combined with the 18-month publication lag makes it unclear whether this is a real pause or simply unpublished pipeline.
Trend data, 2017-2026
Claim Concentration
F24F in 11 of 14 records
IPC share
Air-handling control is the core claim territory
Nearly all records sit in F24F, with heating (F24D) and refrigeration (F25B) codes layered on top of the same families rather than defining separate ones. That overlap signals drafters are claiming damper and valve mechanisms broadly enough to cover both heating and cooling modes.
IPC composition, this corpus
Citation Anchor
US9625184B2 · 11 citations
top-cited record
One family sets the prior-art bar
US9625184B2 and its close relatives US11131467B2 and US20200326082A1 draw the bulk of citations in this corpus, all built around volume-modulating valve or damper mechanisms. Any new ducted-zone airflow control filing is likely to be examined against this cluster first.
Most-cited records
Eureka AI Agent
Looking for what nobody has claimed yet?
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to variable refrigerant flow system air handling, with the prior art for and against each one.
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Co-assignee relationships and derived observations. Derived from a Patsnap search on Variable Refrigerant Flow System Air Handling covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
Players
Who is filing, and how concentrated is it
With only 14 families total, this is not a field with an established multi-player race. A small number of individual and corporate assignees account for the record, and only one co-filing relationship appears at all.
Co-Filing Pattern
1 pair, 2 shared filings
strongest co-assignee link
Individual inventors, not corporate teams, anchor the core patents
The strongest co-assignee relationship in the dataset is Osheroff Jeff and Osheroff Gene, appearing together on two filings. That points to an individually-driven inventive effort behind the volume-modulating valve family rather than a large corporate R&D program.
Co-assignee pairs
Recent Activity
0 filings in latest year
across all tracked assignees
No assignee shows current-year momentum
Every tracked assignee, including Rheem Manufacturing and Trane International, shows zero filings in the most recent year of the dataset. Given the publication lag, this may reflect pending applications not yet public rather than an actual halt in R&D.
Recent-year momentum
Filing Scope
14 families, US-only
receiving office
A US-only prosecution footprint
Every family in this dataset was filed through the United States receiving office. That narrows the read to US competitive dynamics in ducted VRF air handling and says nothing about parallel filing strategies these same assignees may run in other jurisdictions outside this claim scope.
Receiving offices
Recent-year filing momentum by assignee
| Assignee | Recent year | YoY |
|---|---|---|
| Rheem Manufacturing | 0 | — |
| OSHEROFF JEFF | 0 | — |
| Trane International | 0 | — |
| OSHEROFF GENE | 0 | — |
Source: Patsnap Eureka. Assignee-level momentum. Derived from a Patsnap search on Variable Refrigerant Flow System Air Handling covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
What's Next
Where to take this analysis
This landscape identifies the shape of the field. Turning it into a filing or freedom-to-operate decision requires going deeper on the specific claims and the assignees behind them.
Map the damper/valve claim boundaries in detail
US9625184B2, US11131467B2 and US20200326082A1 anchor this corpus by citation count. A claim-by-claim comparison against a draft specification is the fastest way to see whether a new design falls inside or outside their scope.
Explore claims in EurekaTrack the individual-inventor filings
The Osheroff co-filing pair sits behind the most-cited family in this dataset. Watching continuation and re-filing activity from individually-held patents like this can flag licensing or assertion risk before it becomes litigation.
Set up assignee tracking in EurekaSource: Patsnap Eureka. Forward-looking reading of the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Variable Refrigerant Flow System Air Handling covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
FAQ
Common questions on VRF air handling patents
This dataset identifies 14 published patent families matching VRF air-handling terminology and IPC codes for air conditioning, heating and refrigeration equipment, filed between 2015 and 2026. That is a narrow, US-only corpus rather than a global count of all VRF-related filings, since the search combines VRF terms specifically with indoor air-handling claim language. Broader VRF searches without the air-handling qualifier would return a much larger set, dominated by manufacturers outside this specific claim scope.
The most-cited records in this corpus centre on volume-modulating valve and damper mechanisms, with the strongest co-filing relationship being between individual inventors Osheroff Jeff and Osheroff Gene, who share two filings. Corporate assignees including Rheem Manufacturing and Trane International also appear in the dataset but show no filings in the most recent tracked year. This suggests the foundational claims in this niche came from individually-driven invention rather than a large corporate program.
Not clearly. Filing activity in this dataset peaked at three families in 2023, but dropped to zero at the 2022 midpoint and shows no filings from any tracked assignee in the latest year. Because patent publications typically lag filing by around 18 months, the most recent one to two years understate real activity, so this may reflect a genuine slowdown or simply pending applications that have not yet published.
US11131467B2 claims an HVAC system combining a VRF outdoor compressor unit with an indoor fan coil unit that distributes air to multiple ducted zones, each fitted with a volume-modulating damper that holds a set airflow volume as duct pressure shifts. It sits in a closely related family with US9625184B2 and US20200326082A1, and this cluster draws the highest citation counts in the dataset. Any new design using per-zone volume-modulating dampers to compensate for duct pressure changes should be checked against this family's specific claim language before filing.
Filing density in this corpus concentrates heavily around volume-modulating valve and damper mechanisms, leaving adjacent branches thinner: zone-level sensor feedback for damper control, combined heating/cooling mode-switching logic, fan coil noise and vibration mitigation, and retrofit ducting that bridges VRF with legacy duct systems. None of these appear as a dense cluster in the citation data, which makes them worth a closer freedom-to-operate look before assuming they are already claimed.
Answers are grounded in the same dataset. Derived from a Patsnap search on Variable Refrigerant Flow System Air Handling covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish.Run this in Eureka MCP
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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.