CPC technology class · G01

G01S — Radio Direction-finding

Radio direction-finding; radio navigation; determining distance or velocity by use of radio waves; locating or presence-detecting by use of the reflection or reradiation of radio waves; analogous arrangements using other waves. 52,756 US utility patents granted 2015–2025, with the leading assignees and year-by-year filing trajectory.

52,756
US patents granted
G01
Parent CPC class
20
Active assignees
+79%
5-yr velocity
Top assignee: QUALCOMM Incorporated (1,673 patents)

CPC subclass G01S — RADIO DIRECTION-FINDING; RADIO NAVIGATION; DETERMINING DISTANCE OR VELOCITY BY USE OF RADIO WAVES; LOCATING OR PRESENCE-DETECTING BY USE OF THE REFLECTION OR RERADIATION OF RADIO WAVES; ANALOGOUS ARRANGEMENTS USING OTHER WAVES — covers 52,756 US utility patents granted between 2015 and 2025 according to USPTO PatentsView records. This subclass sits within the broader CPC class G01 (MEASURING; TESTING), one of roughly 250 top-level technology categories in the Cooperative Patent Classification system jointly maintained by the USPTO and the European Patent Office. At the subclass level, four-character codes like G01S give the most practical resolution for tracking a specific technology domain without losing sight of adjacent filings. Every grant here has been classified by a USPTO examiner based on the technical disclosure in the patent specification.

The competitive landscape in G01S is shaped by 20 distinct companies actively filing in this space. QUALCOMM Incorporated leads with 1,673 patents, followed by Robert Bosch GmbH at 11,869 grants and Waymo LLC at 1,901. Concentration at the top of the leaderboard indicates whether this technology area is dominated by a handful of incumbents or fragmented across many filers — a useful signal for investors evaluating competitive moats and for product teams mapping freedom-to-operate risk.

Filing trajectory matters as much as static counts. The yearly series on this page plots grants from 2015 through 2025, highlighting whether innovation in G01S is accelerating, plateauing, or cooling. Technology areas with rising post-2020 activity often reflect emerging markets or new platform shifts, while declining filings can signal mature domains where incremental improvement has slowed. Researchers, licensing professionals, and competitive-intelligence teams use these patterns — together with the top-assignee distribution — to decide where to invest, where to license, and where to avoid entanglement. All counts on this page come directly from USPTO PatentsView and reflect US granted utility patents only.

Is G01S innovation accelerating?

US utility-patent grants per year in G01S, 2015–2025 — recent five years are up 79% versus 2015–2019.

2,0003,0004,0005,0006,0007,000 20152016201720182019202020212022202320242025 4,447

Who leads G01S?

The 12 most active assignees in RADIO DIRECTION-FINDING; RADIO NAVIGATION; DETERMINING DISTANCE OR VELOCITY BY USE OF RADIO WAVES; LOCATING OR PRESENCE-DETECTING BY USE OF THE REFLECTION OR RERADIATION OF RADIO WAVES; ANALOGOUS ARRANGEMENTS USING OTHER WAVES — wider bars mean more grants

patents

What this shows Qualcomm Incorporated is the most active filer in G01S, holding 1,673 of the 52,756 patents in this class. Concentration at the top signals how contestable this technology area is for new entrants.

Source USPTO PatentsView — granted utility patents As of 2015–2025 grant years
View data table

About This Class

CPC subclass G01S belongs to class G01.

52,756 patents were granted in this class between 2015 and 2025.

20 companies actively patent in this space.

Classification System

Cooperative Patent Classification (CPC) is a hierarchical patent classification system used by the USPTO and EPO.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is CPC class G01S?
CPC subclass G01S covers RADIO DIRECTION-FINDING; RADIO NAVIGATION; DETERMINING DISTANCE OR VELOCITY BY USE OF RADIO WAVES; LOCATING OR PRESENCE-DETECTING BY USE OF THE REFLECTION OR RERADIATION OF RADIO WAVES; ANALOGOUS ARRANGEMENTS USING OTHER WAVES. It belongs to CPC class G01 (MEASURING; TESTING). The Cooperative Patent Classification is a hierarchical system used by the USPTO and European Patent Office to categorize patents by technology.
How many patents have been filed in G01S?
52,756 US utility patents were granted in CPC subclass G01S between 2015 and 2025, based on USPTO PatentsView data.
Which company holds the most patents in G01S?
QUALCOMM Incorporated leads G01S with 1,673 patents, making it the most active assignee in this technology area.
How is patent data for G01S collected?
Patent data comes from USPTO PatentsView, a public research dataset maintained by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. It covers all US granted utility patents and assigns CPC codes based on the technology described in each patent.
What is the difference between CPC class and subclass?
A CPC class (e.g., G01) is a broad technology category. Subclasses like G01S provide finer granularity within that category. PlainPatent organizes data at the subclass level (4-character codes) for the most useful view of technology domains.

Learn More

Explore the patent dataset

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