Miniaturized Gas Sensor Patent Landscape, 2018 - ResearchAndMarkets.com

The "Miniaturized
Gas Sensor Patent Landscape" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's
offering.

BOSCH and AMS dominate miniaturized gas sensor related patents

The gas sensor market is growing, driven by Heating, Ventilation and Air
Conditioning (HVAC) and air comfort for transportation which are poised
to experience the highest Compound Annual Growth Rates (CAGRs) from
2017-2023 of 15% and 12.5% respectively.

The miniaturization of gas sensors has allowed their introduction to
consumer applications and their manufacture in large volumes. We believe
miniaturized gas sensors will be increasingly used to resolve
form-factor/cost issues in consumer, HVAC and air comfort for
transportation applications. At the beginning of this new era for gas
sensors, understanding the Intellectual Property (IP) position and
strategy of historical gas sensor players as well as identifying the key
IP players and the newcomers is crucial.

In this report, the author has thoroughly investigated the patent
landscape related to miniaturized gas sensors, covering gas sensing
technologies using micro-fabrication techniques to reduce form-factor,
cost, and power consumption.

Our patent landscape analysis shows significant changes in the
competitive IP landscape since our previous analysis in 2016. We have
seen a big increase in patenting activity related to miniaturized gas
sensors in 2017-2018, mainly due to new inventions from Bosch, AMS, NGK,
Sensirion and from new entrants such as MicroJet Technology, Spirosure,
Carrier Corporation, LG and Apple.

The patent filings currently pending reflect a particular interest of
the competitors in European and Chinese markets. Historical IP players
Siemens, Honeywell and General Electric have the strongest patent
portfolios, especially Siemens, which shows the most important
contribution to the prior art in the field of miniaturized gas sensors.
Bosch is indisputably this field's current IP leader, and in the last
two years, it has strengthened its IP position in both miniaturized
electrical and optical gas sensing technologies.

AMS is the IP player that saw the biggest change in its IP position in
miniaturized gas sensors in recent years. AMS' IP portfolio now benefits
from key patents from recent acquisitions of CMOS Sensors, Applied
Sensor and NXP's CMOS sensor business, which today offer it the
capability to limit the IP activity of other players, especially on
electrical and thermal miniaturized gas sensors.

TDK-Micronas and the CEA French R&D Lab own the highest number of
enforceable patents relating to miniaturized gas sensors, but both
decreased their patenting activity in the last two years, which could
affect their IP position in the future.

Analysing patents of each sensing technology

The patents have been categorized according to the claimed sensing
technology, including electrical, thermal, optical, electro-chemical,
electro-mechanical, acoustic and chromatography. In this report, we
analyze patents of each sensing technology and discuss the relative
strength of the patent assignees, highlight the key patents and identify
the IP newcomers.

From a patent point of view, the electrical and thermal technologies
remain the two most competitive miniaturized gas sensor segments. TDK
Micronas and Siemens are the best-established IP players in miniaturized
electrical gas sensor segment, but they suffer from low patenting
activity levels that limit their ability to strengthen and develop their
IP position in coming years.

Bosch and AMS will stay neck-and-neck in the electrical IP segment while
AMS is leading the thermal segment and will probably secure its IP
position in the next few years. Bosch and AMS currently compete in the
thermal gas sensors IP segment, while TDK-Micronas and VTT are just
entering the IP landscape.

The IP landscape relating to miniaturized optical gas sensors is also
competitive but less settled than the electric one. Honeywell is the
most established IP player with the highest number of enforceable
patents and several seminal patents. Bosch is leading patenting activity
in optical sensing technology, but Infineon and AMS are its two main IP
competitors.

The electro-chemical gas sensor-related IP landscape is small but has
seen a strong boost in patenting activity in 2017 thanks to Bosch's new
patent filings on solid electrolyte technology. Beside other IP players
involved in electro-chemical sensing technology like NGK and Spec
Sensors, we noticed the entrance of Spirosure, which has co-filed
patents with NGK, Analog Devices, Figaro Engineering and Withings, which
was formerly Nokia Health.

The patenting activity related to electro-mechanical gas sensors has
shown a progressive increase since 2012. The electro-mechanical IP
segment is dominated by academic players like the CEA in France and by
the recent patenting activity of Bosch, and we observed the entrance of
IP newcomers like MicroJet Technology, Sensirion and Nissha.

Infineon is currently the most active IP player in miniaturized acoustic
gas sensors. Other key patent owners involved in acoustic sensing
technology are Siemens, Honeywell, CEA, Tricorntech, VTT and
ProterixBio. The IP landscape relating to chromatography-based
miniaturized gas sensors comprises few patents owned by R&D labs like
CEA and small companies like Alpha MOS, MicroJet Technology, TrueDyne
Sensors, iSenLab.

The report also includes an Excel database with the >3,500 patents
analyzed in this study. This useful patent database allows for
multi-criteria searches and includes patent publication numbers,
hyperlinks to the original documents, priority date, title, abstract,
patent assignees, each patent's current legal status, and sensing
technologies.

Key Topics Covered

1. Introduction

• Scope of the report
• Key features of the report
• Benefits for customer
• Gas sensor segments
• 2017-2023 gas sensors market forecast

2. Methodology

• Patent search, selection and analysis
• Patent search strategy
• Terminologies for patent analysis

3. Executive Summary

4. Patent Landscape Overview

• Time evolution of patent publications
• Main patent assignees
• Time evolution of patent assignees
• Current legal status of patents
• Geographic coverage of patent filings

5. IP Position Of Patent Assignees

• IP leadership of patent assignees
• IP blocking potential of patent assignees
• Strength of patent portfolios

6. Patent Segmentation

• Patent categorization
• Number of patent families per segment
• Time evolution of patent publications for each segment
• Patent assignees vs. Segments

7. Segments Analysis

• Electrical, Optical, Thermal, Electro-Chemical, Electro-Mechanical,
  Acoustic, Chromatography
• Key IP players and newcomers for each segment
• For each segment:
  • Technology description
  • Key IP players and their key patents
  • IP newcomers and their key patents
• Electrical gas sensors
• CNTs/Graphene gas sensors
• Optical gas sensors
• Thermal gas sensors
• Electro-Mechanical gas sensors
• Electro-Chemical gas sensors
• Acoustic gas sensors
• Chromatography gas sensors

8. IP Profile Of Key Players

• Bosch
• AMS
• For each player:
  • Company presentation
  • Summary of the patent portfolio
  • IP portfolio analysis
  • Key patents for miniaturize gas sensors
  • Comparison of IP portfolio of Bosch and AMS

9. Patents near Expiration

10. Conclusion

Companies Mentioned

• A*STAR
• Alpha MOS
• amos
• AMS
• Analog Devices
• Bosch
• CalTech
• CEA
• Cyrano Sciences
• Figaro Engineering
• Ford
• Fujitsu
• General Electric
• Goertek
• Honeywell
• Infineon
• Intel
• InvenSense
• iSenLab
• KAIST
• LG
• MicroJet Technology
• NGK
• Nissha
• NUAA
• NXP
• PARC
• ProterixBio
• Sensirion
• Siemens
• Spec Sensors
• Spirosure
• SRI International
• Sumitomo
• TDK-Micronas
• Toshiba
• Tricorntech
• Truedyne
• VTT
• Withings

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/c55af0

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