Where does Nippon Steel Corporation rank among US patent assignees?

According to USPTO PatentsView (2015–2025 granted utility patents), Nippon Steel Corporation ranks #338 of 49,997 assignees by granted-patent volume, the same sort as the companies listing and top-holders ranking. See /methodology/#corpus-placement.

How many patents does Nippon Steel Corporation hold?

Nippon Steel Corporation holds 1,289 US utility patents granted between 2017 and 2025, spanning 157 technology areas.

What is Nippon Steel Corporation's Innovation Score?

Nippon Steel Corporation has an Innovation Score of 62.9 out of 100 (top 2% of the corpus). This composite metric weighs portfolio volume (40%), grant velocity (20%), technology breadth (25%), and claim depth (15%).

What technology areas does Nippon Steel Corporation focus on?

Nippon Steel Corporation's top technology area is C22C (Alloys) with 691 patents, ranking #2 of 948 assignees active in that subclass. Grants appear in 157 CPC subclasses total.

Is Nippon Steel Corporation's patent grant rate increasing or decreasing?

Nippon Steel Corporation's recent grant velocity is +712% compared to the prior five-year period (grant years, not application filing dates). This indicates accelerating grant output.

What does claim depth mean for Nippon Steel Corporation's patents?

Nippon Steel Corporation's patents average 9.3 claims each. This is an aggregate descriptive count from the grant record; it does not establish claim scope, legal strength, enforceability, or design-around risk.

How is the Nippon Steel Corporation patent data sourced?

All patent data comes from USPTO PatentsView, a public research dataset maintained by the United States Patent and Trademark Office covering US granted utility patents from 2015 to 2025.

USPTO 2015–2025 USPTO PatentsView Foreign Corporation

Nippon Steel Corporation

USPTO PatentsView assignee record - 1,289 granted patents across 157 technology areas, recorded in grant years 2017–2025. Grant-trend analysis is cross-referenced to USPTO Patent Public Search; it does not measure application filings, current R&D, or legal strength. Primary class: C22C (Alloys).

Compiled by PlainPatent · May 15, 2026

RSS updates for this company

Explore the portfolio See the ranking

The verdict

According to USPTO PatentsView, Nippon ranks #338 of 49,997 tracked US assignees by granted-patent volume, with 1,289 patents across 157 technology areas.

#338
of 49,997 US assignees by volume: Top 2%
by Innovation Score (62.9/100): 9.3
avg claims per patent: +712%
grant velocity, last 5 yrs

USPTO PatentsView assignee plate

Corpus R338 · Foreign Corporation #338 · 1,289 grants

GRANTS-LARGE · TOP-DECILE · PHOTO-FINISH · CPC-WIDE · INNOV-STRONG · CLAIMS-PAR · TYPE-FRNCORP · VEL-SURGE · BOOK-FULL

GRANTS-LARGE 1.3K grants
TOP-DECILE #338/49,997
PHOTO-FINISH Makita
CPC-WIDE C22C · 157 areas
INNOV-STRONG 62.9/100
CLAIMS-PAR 9.3 claims/avg
TYPE-FRNCORP Foreign Corp
VEL-SURGE +712% vel
BOOK-FULL 10/10 fields

Nearest grant-volume peer: Makita Corporation (±3 grants)

Instrument codes from this assignee’s USPTO PatentsView grant sheet: volume band, corpus rank, photo-finish peer, lead CPC, Innovation Score, claim depth, assignee type, velocity, and book completeness. Not a USPTO rating of patent strength.

How Nippon’s 62.9 Innovation Score adds up

The same four weighted components behind every Innovation Score on PlainPatent: portfolio volume, grant velocity, technology breadth, and claim depth.

Volume 24.7 pts (39%) Velocity 7.6 pts (12%) Breadth 25.0 pts (40%) Claim depth 5.6 pts (9%)

Qualcomm Incorporated · highest

85
Shenzhen Goodix… · near

63
Cargill Incorporated · near

63
Nippon Steel · this assignee

63
Safran · near

63
Richtek Technology · near

63
3D Lighting… · lowest

7

What this shows Nippon's Innovation Score is 62.9/100 (top 2% of the PatentsView-derived corpus). The chart places that score against the nearest Innovation Score peers plus corpus poles, not a reprint of the volume ranking.

Does more volume mean deeper claims for Nippon?

Each dot is one of Nippon’s 8 nearest volume peers (same corpus rank neighbourhood as the chart above), placed by total granted patents (horizontal) against average claims per patent (vertical). Nippon’s own 9.3 claims/patent is at or below the 14.7 median for these volume peers. Volume here does not track with deeper claims; several lower-volume peers claim more thoroughly per patent.

Nippon vs its 8 nearest volume peers: granted patents vs average claims per patent. Source: USPTO PatentsView.

How Nippon's grant cadence moved

Between 2020–2024, Nippon Steel Corporation received 1,007 grants versus 124 in 2015–2019 (+712% equal-window velocity, top decile growth). Across complete PatentsView years, output peaked in 2024 at 246 grants and bottomed in 2017 at 1. Lead class C22C accounts for 53.6% of the portfolio across 157 subclasses. Volume neighbours: Life Technologies Corporation (#334) and Terumo Kabushiki Kaisha (#342).

Nippon's three-year grant acceleration

From 2019–2021 to 2022–2024, Nippon Steel Corporation moved from 529 to 601 grants (1.14x the prior three-year total, a multiple, not a CAGR). Among 3,296 tracked assignees with ≥100 grants and ≥20 prior-period grants, that multiple ranks #895. See the growth leaderboard.

Life

1,296
Yamaha

1,296
Google Technology…

1,294
Makita

1,292
Nippon Steel ◀

1,289
SZ DJI Technology

1,268
Edwards Lifescien…

1,265
The Trustees of t…

1,264
Terumo

1,250

What this shows Nippon holds 1,289 patents at rank #338, shown against the 8 assignees closest to it in grant volume rather than the industry's largest filers.

Companies ranked near Nippon

By rank, the assignees closest to #338 in granted patent volume.

Leaders in C22C (Alloys)

Other assignees with the most granted patents in Nippon's primary technology class.

Assignees with similar portfolio profiles

Two PlainPatent-derived peer sets for Nippon, neither rank-band nor same-CPC leaders (those blocks stay above). In C22C (Alloys), Nippon ranks #2 of 948 assignees by patent count in that subclass.

Similar innovation score

Nearest assignees by Innovation Score (63 here).

Cargill, Incorporated 63 Safran 63 Shenzhen Goodix Technology Co., Ltd. 63 Richtek Technology Corporation 63

Similar claim depth

Nearest assignees by average claims per patent (9.3 here).

Delta T, LLC 9.3 avg Warn Industries, Inc. 9.3 avg Showa Corporation 9.4 avg Edgewell Personal Care Brands, LLC 9.3 avg

Nippon's Innovation Score vs. every tracked assignee

Composite of portfolio volume, grant velocity, technology breadth, and claim depth (0–100)

63 Top 2% higher than 98% of 49,997 US assignees

Each bar is a band; taller bars hold more US assignees. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count, share, and where it sits relative to this entry.

Source USPTO PatentsView, PlainPatent Innovation Score · 2015–2025

USPTO utility patent grants by year · 2017–2025

Grants by year

Teal-shaded recent years (2020–present) versus the 2017–2019 baseline. Full figures in the table below.

View data table

Nippon Steel Corporation patent grants by year, 2015–2025
Year	Patents Granted	Share of Period
2017	1	0.1%
2019	123	9.5%
2020	224	17.4%
2021	182	14.1%
2022	207	16.1%
2023	148	11.5%
2024	246	19.1%
2025partial year	158	12.3%

Which technologies does Nippon Steel Corporation patent most?

C22C - Alloys 691

C21D - Modifying THE Physical Structure OF Ferrous METALS; General Devices FOR Heat Treatment OF Ferrous OR Non-ferrous Metals OR ALLOYS; Making Metal Malleable, e.g. BY Decarburisation OR Tempering 616

C23C - Coating Metallic MATERIAL; Coating Material With Metallic MATERIAL; Surface Treatment OF Metallic Material BY Diffusion Into THE Surface, BY Chemical Conversion OR SUBSTITUTION; Coating BY Vacuum Evaporation, BY Sputtering, BY ION Implantation OR BY Chemical Vapour Deposition, IN General 357

B32B - Layered Products, i.e. Products Built-up OF Strata OF Flat OR Non-flat, e.g. Cellular OR Honeycomb, Form 244

B21D - Working OR Processing OF Sheet Metal OR Metal Tubes, Rods OR Profiles Without Essentially Removing MATERIAL; Punching Metal 195

H01F - MAGNETS; INDUCTANCES; TRANSFORMERS; Selection OF Materials FOR Their Magnetic Properties 167

Y10T - Technical Subjects Covered BY Former US Classification 121

Y02P - Climate Change Mitigation Technologies IN THE Production OR Processing OF Goods 107

B23K - Soldering OR UNSOLDERING; WELDING; Cladding OR Plating BY Soldering OR WELDING; Cutting BY Applying Heat Locally, e.g. Flame CUTTING; Working BY Laser Beam 106

B62D - Motor VEHICLES; Trailers 102

F16L - PIPES; Joints OR Fittings FOR PIPES; Supports FOR Pipes, Cables OR Protective TUBING; Means FOR Thermal Insulation IN General 99

C25D - Processes FOR THE Electrolytic OR Electrophoretic Production OF COATINGS; ELECTROFORMING; Apparatus Therefor 91

B21B - Rolling OF Metal 76

E21B - Earth OR Rock DRILLING; Obtaining OIL, GAS, Water, Soluble OR Meltable Materials OR A Slurry OF Minerals From Wells 68

B22D - Casting OF METALS; Casting OF Other Substances BY THE Same Processes OR Devices 58

Top 15 of 157 technology areas

More on this record

Data Source

USPTO PatentsView, US granted patents 2015–2025

View all rankings → How is Innovation Score calculated?

What to do with this data

Nippon Steel Corporation's patent record in context - here's where to go next.

Nippon Steel Corporation's lead technology class is C22C (Alloys), 53.6% of its portfolio - see every assignee active in that class. Explore C22C
Ranked #338 of 49,997 tracked assignees by patent volume - see the full leaderboard. See the ranking
Compare Nippon Steel Corporation against Life Technologies Corporation, an assignee filing at a similar volume. Compare portfolios
Innovation Score of 62.9/100 blends volume, velocity, technology breadth, and claim depth. How it's calculated

Figures reflect USPTO PatentsView grant data through May 2026; pending applications not yet granted are not counted.

Data sourced from USPTO PatentsView - official U.S. government patent data. See our methodology for computation details. Retrieved and formatted by PlainPatent

Disclaimer: This information is provided for informational purposes only and does not constitute professional advice. Data is sourced from the USPTO PatentsView database. Consult a qualified professional before making decisions based on this data.

Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.

Data sources used on this page

USPTO PatentsView - the disambiguated bulk patent-grant, assignee, and CPC data this page's figures are derived from. patentsview.org
Cooperative Patent Classification (CPC) - the joint USPTO/EPO classification scheme used to group patents by technology area. cooperativepatentclassification.org
USPTO Patent Public Search - the official interface to verify the status of any individual patent. ppubs.uspto.gov

Compiled by PlainPatent , US Patent Intelligence Editorial Process · May 15, 2026

Every figure on PlainPatent is rendered directly from USPTO source data, no number is typed in by an editor. This page draws directly on USPTO source data, no figure is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of May 2026.