Wave Energy PTO Patents: Leaders & Filing Trends 2026
A patent landscape analysis of wave energy power take-off (PTO) technology, covering 306 records, filing trends from 2015 to 2026, IPC technology composition, and the concentration of filings among leading assignees.
Filing growth = 2021 (6 records) → 2024 (7); 2024 is the last year we treat as complete. Top-5 share = the 5 largest assignees ÷ all 306 records in scope (CR5), not the ranked leaders only.
What this landscape covers
Wave energy power take-off (PTO) systems convert the mechanical motion of a floating or submerged device into usable electrical power. This landscape covers 306 published records filed between 2015 and 2026 that describe PTO mechanisms for wave energy converters, drawn from a search across title, abstract and claims text. The scope spans hydraulic, mechanical and electrical conversion routes, along with the gearing, control and marine-vessel integration work that surrounds them.
Filing is heavily weighted toward hydraulic conversion architecture, with a long tail of single- and few-filing entrants behind a small group of assignees that account for most of the corpus. The data below breaks down who holds that position, what technology classes carry the claim density, and where the record concentrates by filing office.
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Filing trends and technology composition
Two views of the same 306-record corpus: the pace at which filings have arrived, and the technology classes those filings actually claim.
Filing trend: a 2017 peak, then a cooler decade
Filings peaked at 31 records in 2017 and have not returned to that level since. Reading only the years that are complete post-publication-lag, the 2021-2024 window shows a real increase of +17%, from 6 to 7 records — a modest recovery rather than a resurgence. The 2025 and 2026 figures are too fresh to read as a decline; publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, so recent years are still filling in.
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: hydraulic PTO dominates the claim space
F03B (hydraulic machines and engines) appears in 94.8% of the 306 records in scope, confirming that most wave PTO patents describe some form of hydraulic conversion stage. H02K (electric motors and generators) trails at 16.3%, E02B (waterway engineering) at 9.2%, and F16H (gearing) at 6.2% — each of these narrower classes marks a smaller, more specific claim space layered on top of the hydraulic core.
Shares are the percentage of the 306 records in scope. A patent can carry several IPC classes, so the shares add up to more than 100%.
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Try EurekaRepresentative filing and most-cited prior art
US20230073634A1 — Wave energy converter
A point absorber wave energy converter uses a surface-piercing float coupled to a water column tube open at its bottom, trapping air above the column in a plenum. Relative movement between the float and the internal water column expands and compresses the trapped air, which is used to pump air through an open- or closed-circuit power take-off system.Filed by Dick, published 2023-03-09. Abstract trimmed for length; see the source record for the full claim set.
| # | Publication no. | Patent title | Citations |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | US20100331663A1 | Dual mode closed-loop system and method for measuring a parameter of the muscular-skeletal system | 91 |
| 2 | US20100331718A1 | Propagation tuned oscillator for orthopedic parameter measurement | 76 |
| 3 | US20100331687A1 | System for continuous wave, pulsed, and pulsed-echo parameter measurement | 74 |
| 4 | US7443046B2 | Wave energy converter utilizing internal reaction mass and spring | 67 |
| 5 | US20070126239A1 | Wave energy converter utilizing internal reaction mass and spring | 64 |
| 6 | US20110084488A1 | Wave energy converter and power take off system | 63 |
| 7 | US20070261404A1 | Active impedance matching systems and methods for wave energy converter | 63 |
| 8 | US7305823B2 | Active impedance matching systems and methods for wave energy converter | 60 |
| 9 | US20100148504A1 | Advanced wave energy converter control | 50 |
| 10 | US20100259047A1 | Power take off apparatus for a WEC | 40 |
Citation counts favour older filings that have had more time to accumulate citations within the searched corpus — read them as a signal of influence on subsequent filers, not as a ranking of current technical importance.
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Four read-outs from the concentration, technology and jurisdiction data that matter for where to file and who to watch.
The field is held by a small group, not a crowd
Top 5 assignees combined account for 77.5% of all 306 records in scope, and the top 10 push that to 86.9%. With 49 companies ranked in total, that leaves a genuinely long tail of single- or few-filing entrants competing for the remaining space.
Hydraulic conversion is the default architecture
Nearly every record in this corpus claims some hydraulic machine or engine element (F03B), while electric generator integration (H02K, 16.3%) and control systems (H02P, 3.3%) are comparatively under-claimed relative to the hydraulic core.
A modest recovery after the 2017 peak
Filings peaked at 31 in 2017 and have not returned to that level, but the 2021-2024 window — the most recent stretch that can be read as complete — shows filings rising from 6 to 7, a +17% increase rather than a continued slide.
Europe leads filing office activity, the US close behind
The EPO carries 71 records, the United States 59, and the PCT route 44 — with Australia, Canada and the UK each in the 20-32 range. That spread signals a field being protected across multiple wave-resource geographies rather than concentrated in a single home market.
Eureka can read the same corpus for gaps instead of for coverage: under-claimed branches adjacent to wave energy: wave energy pto patent landscape, with the prior art for and against each one.
Where to take this analysis
The figures above describe the field as filed. Turning them into a filing or freedom-to-operate decision means going deeper on specific claims and specific holders.
Map the white space in electrical integration
H02K and H02P classes are comparatively thin next to the hydraulic core, suggesting under-claimed territory in generator and control-system integration for wave PTO systems.
Explore with EurekaTrack the concentrated leaders
With 77.5% of records held by five assignees, monitoring their continuation filings and citation patterns is more informative than watching the long tail.
Set up alerts in EurekaCheck claims against a specific design
Run a candidate PTO mechanism against the most-cited and most recent records in this corpus before committing to a hydraulic or electrical conversion architecture.
Run a claim check in EurekaCommon questions on wave energy PTO patents
The corpus is concentrated: five assignees hold 77.5% of all 306 records in scope, and the top ten hold 86.9%. Ocean Power Technologies is the largest single holder in this ranking of 49 companies, with a long tail of firms holding only one or two filings each. That concentration means most freedom-to-operate work in this space centres on a small number of portfolios rather than a broad field of competitors.
Hydraulic power take-off dominates. The IPC class F03B (hydraulic machines and engines) appears in 94.8% of the 306 records in scope, far ahead of electric generator integration under H02K at 16.3%. This does not mean hydraulic PTO is technically superior — it means the claim space around hydraulic conversion stages is far more densely occupied, so a new hydraulic-only filing faces denser prior art than an electrical-integration filing would.
Filing peaked in 2017 at 31 records and has not returned to that level since, but that headline masks a more complete recent picture. Looking only at the years that have had time to fully publish, filings rose from 6 in 2021 to 7 in 2024, a +17% increase. Figures for 2025 and 2026 are still filling in because publication typically lags filing by around 18 months, so they should not yet be read as a further decline.
The European Patent Office leads with 71 records, followed by the United States at 59 and the PCT (WIPO) international route at 44. Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom each fall in the 20-32 record range. The spread across these offices indicates that wave PTO developers are protecting inventions across multiple wave-resource geographies rather than relying on a single home jurisdiction.
Relative to the hydraulic core covered by F03B, classes like H02K (electric generators), H02P (motor and generator control) and F15B (fluid-pressure actuators) each appear in under 17% of the 306 records in scope. That gap suggests electrical-side integration and control-system claims are comparatively under-claimed next to the mechanical conversion stage, which is where new filers may find more open claim space rather than competing directly on hydraulic architecture.
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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.