Oscillating Water Column Patents: Top Companies & Trends 2026
A data-backed look at oscillating water column wave energy patents: filing trends, leading assignees, technology composition and white space, drawn from 1,612 records filed 2015-2026.
Filing growth = 2021 (105 records) → 2024 (53); 2024 is the last year we treat as complete. Top-5 share = the 5 largest assignees ÷ all 1,612 records in scope (CR5), not the ranked leaders only.
What the oscillating water column patent record shows
An oscillating water column (OWC) device uses a partially submerged chamber: incoming waves compress and decompress trapped air, which drives a turbine to generate electricity. It is one of the more mechanically simple wave energy conversion routes, which is part of why the patent record around it is dense rather than sparse. Across 1,612 records filed between 2015 and 2026, claim activity concentrates heavily on the hydraulic and power take-off side of the device rather than on the chamber structure itself.
The filing curve rose to a peak in 2021 and has come down since, though the most recent years understate real activity because publication typically lags filing by around eighteen months. Ownership of the field is top-heavy but not dominated by a single actor — the leading assignee holds a meaningful share, but the ranked list falls off quickly after the first several names, leaving a long tail of smaller filers.
Receiving-office data shows filing spread across the United States, China, Europe, the United Kingdom, the WIPO PCT route and Australia, consistent with a technology being pursued as a global rather than a single-market opportunity.
Filing trend and technology composition
Two views of the same 1,612-record dataset: how filing activity has moved year over year, and which IPC subclasses carry the claim weight.
Filing trend, 2017-2026
Filings rose from 65 in 2017 to a peak of 105 in 2021, then declined to 53 by 2024 — a fall of about 50% over that three-year span. 2025 and 2026 figures are still incomplete because of publication lag and should not be read as a continued decline.
Publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so 2025 onwards are still filling in. Growth rates on this page therefore end at 2024; running them to the last bar would understate the field.
Technology composition by IPC subclass
Hydraulic machines and engines (F03B) appear in 55.3% of the 1,612 records in scope, far ahead of hydraulic and waterway engineering (E02B) at 12.8% and wind motor crossover claims (F03D) at 11.0%. Marine vessel structure (B63B), turbine mechanics (F01D) and generator hardware (H02K) each hold smaller but non-trivial shares, and because records can carry multiple classes these figures sum to more than 100%.
Shares are the percentage of the 1,612 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
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Try EurekaA representative claim and the most-cited prior art
Offshore Oscillating Water Column Wave Energy Conversion Device With External Permeable Structure
Filed by Dalian University of Technology, this application combines an oscillating water column system with an anchoring fixing system and an external permeable structure, aiming to improve how the device is integrated with the surrounding offshore structure rather than altering the core air-turbine energy conversion path.Abstract condensed from the original filing.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US3485706A | Textile-like patterned nonwoven fabrics and their production | 1,633 |
| 2 | US3508308A | Jet-treatment process for producing nonpatterned and line-entangled nonwoven fabrics | 232 |
| 3 | US3493462A | Nonpatterned,nonwoven fabric | 181 |
| 4 | US5401262A | Fluid recovery system | 170 |
| 5 | US20040208602A1 | Free space optical communications link tolerant of atmospheric interference | 161 |
| 6 | US20190353139A1 | Inertial pneumatic wave energy device | 149 |
| 7 | US5097710A | Ultrasonic flash gauge | 146 |
| 8 | US3901443A | Ultrasonic wave nebulizer | 145 |
| 9 | US4512197A | Apparatus for generating a focusable and scannable ultrasonic beam for non-destructive examination | 93 |
| 10 | US4167147A | Method and apparatus for stabilizing a floating structure | 85 |
Citation counts reward older filings that have had more time to accumulate references, so treat this table as a map of influence rather than of current commercial relevance.
Each row carries its publication number; clicking a row searches Eureka by that number.
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Browse MCP servers →What the numbers mean for a filing decision
Four read-outs from the dataset that matter more for strategy than the raw counts alone.
The top five hold a modest but real share
The five most active assignees together account for 14.0% of all 1,612 records in scope, and the top ten reach 21.1%. That leaves close to four-fifths of the field held by assignees outside the ranked leaders, so freedom-to-operate work cannot stop at the largest names.
Activity has cooled from its 2021 peak
Filings hit 105 in 2021 and fell to 53 by 2024, a decline of roughly 50% over three years. That drop follows years of build-up from 65 filings in 2017, so it reads as a maturing wave of filing rather than an abandoned technology.
The power take-off is the crowded ground
More than half of all records carry an F03B hydraulic machines and engines classification, making the turbine and air-flow conversion path the most heavily claimed part of the device. Chamber geometry and structural classes such as E02B and B63B carry meaningfully less density.
Filing is genuinely multi-jurisdictional
The United States, China, Europe, the United Kingdom, WIPO's PCT route and Australia each show over a hundred filings, indicating that applicants are pursuing protection across several major markets rather than concentrating on one home jurisdiction.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to wave energy: oscillating water column patent landscape, with the prior art for and against each one.
Where to take this analysis
The dataset points to a field with occupied core claim space and a long tail of smaller filers — the next steps depend on whether you are clearing a design or looking for an entry point.
Map freedom-to-operate around the power take-off
With F03B claims touching over half the dataset, a design targeting the turbine or air-flow path needs a focused clearance search before committing to a chamber-and-turbine configuration.
Explore the claim landscapeTrack the assignees outside the ranked leaders
With roughly four-fifths of filings held outside the top ten, the more interesting freedom-to-operate risk may sit with single- or double-filing entrants rather than the largest names.
Review the assignee rankingWatch structural and integration claims
Classes like E02B and B63B carry lower density than the power take-off, suggesting more room to differentiate on mooring, anchoring or structural integration than on the core energy conversion mechanism.
Compare technology branchesCommon questions about oscillating water column patents
The dataset used for this landscape covers 1,612 published patent records filed between 2015 and 2026, drawn from a search across titles, abstracts and claims for oscillating water column terminology. This includes filings across major receiving offices including the United States, China, Europe, the United Kingdom, WIPO's PCT route and Australia. Because publication typically lags filing by around eighteen months, the most recent one to two years in this count are understated and will rise as more filings publish.
The assignee ranking behind this dataset covers 100 companies and research institutions, with the leading assignee holding 60 records out of 1,612 total. Filing activity drops off relatively quickly after the top few names — the fifth-ranked assignee holds 28 records and the tenth-ranked holds 21 — leaving a long tail of organisations with only a handful of filings each. This pattern is common in energy hardware fields where university research groups and smaller engineering firms file alongside larger industrial players.
Filing rose from 65 records in 2017 to a peak of 105 in 2021, then declined to 53 by 2024, a fall of roughly 50% over that three-year span. That decline should be read as a cooling from a filing peak rather than as the technology losing relevance, since prior years show sustained build-up before the peak. Figures for 2025 and 2026 are still incomplete due to publication lag and should not be used to judge the current trajectory.
The power take-off and air-flow conversion path is the most heavily claimed area: 55.3% of all 1,612 records in scope carry an F03B hydraulic machines and engines classification, well ahead of hydraulic and waterway engineering claims at 12.8% and wind-turbine-crossover claims at 11.0%. This means the turbine, valve and generator hardware sitting on top of the water column chamber is the densest prior art territory. Structural and chamber-integration claims, by comparison, show comparatively lower density and may offer more room to differentiate a new design.
The clearest opening is outside the crowded power take-off classification: structural and integration classes such as E02B (hydraulic and waterway engineering) and B63B (ships and marine vessels) show lower filing density than F03B, suggesting more room to claim novel mooring, anchoring or offshore-integration approaches. The long tail of the assignee ranking, where roughly four-fifths of the 1,612 records sit outside the top ten filers, also points to a fragmented ownership structure rather than a single blocking incumbent. Any white-space search should still be paired with a formal freedom-to-operate review before filing.
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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.