Public landscape · August 2026
Rare-earth-free magnet patents: the August 2026 landscape
Rare-earth export controls turned these technologies into a supply-chain race, and the patents show who is ahead.
Patent families on iron nitride, Mn–Bi, Mn–Al–C, advanced ferrites, L10 FeNi, rare-earth-lean designs and rare-earth-free motor topologies. Counts come from our monthly landscape report for August 2026, rebuilt on 2026-10-05 from publications dated 2021-09-27 to 2026-08-31: 3,355 publications in 2,417 patent families within the published scope.
August 2026 in brief
- 41 new patent families (67 publications) across 7 offices: CN, DE, EP, JP, KR, US and WO.
- Trailing twelve months (2025-09-01 to 2026-08-31): 398 families, against 416 in the twelve months before.
- Most active technology over twelve months: rare-earth-free motor topologies, 162 families, followed by advanced ferrites with 157.
- Largest increase: rare-earth-lean designs, 53 families against 30 the year before.
- Iron nitride (Fe16N2): 4 families, against 6 the year before.
New families by quarter
Families are counted in the quarter of their first publication. 2026-Q3 covers July and August only (this report ends on 2026-08-31), and new publications reach our sources several weeks after they are published (Chinese ones three weeks or more).
| Quarter | New families | Publications |
|---|---|---|
| 2024-Q4 | 129 | 191 |
| 2025-Q1 | 98 | 152 |
| 2025-Q2 | 90 | 145 |
| 2025-Q3 | 88 | 145 |
| 2025-Q4 | 73 | 163 |
| 2026-Q1 | 108 | 164 |
| 2026-Q2 | 107 | 173 |
| 2026-Q3 (to date) | 81 | 138 |
By technology, trailing twelve months
| Technology | Families | Previous 12 months |
|---|---|---|
| RE-free motor topologies | 162 | 181 |
| Advanced ferrites | 157 | 182 |
| Rare-earth-lean designs | 53 | 30 |
| Mn–Bi | 9 | 8 |
| Mn–Al–C | 6 | 2 |
| Other | 5 | 4 |
| Iron nitride (Fe16N2) | 4 | 6 |
| L10 FeNi / tetrataenite | 2 | 3 |
By office, trailing twelve months
A family is counted once in each office where a member has published, so the rows add up to more than the family total. German (DE) publications without English text are mostly outside our sources before 2026, so the DE row is a coverage effect, not a trend.
| Office | Families | Previous 12 months |
|---|---|---|
| CNIPA (CN) | 309 | 366 |
| WIPO (PCT) | 41 | 38 |
| USPTO (US) | 20 | 23 |
| DPMA (DE) | 15 | 0 |
| KIPO (KR) | 14 | 12 |
| EPO (EP) | 11 | 11 |
| JPO (JP) | 10 | 11 |
| TIPO (TW) | 2 | 4 |
| OSIM (RO) | 2 | 0 |
From the weekly briefing: issue #1
Opening note of issue #1 (coverage period 2026-09-01 to 2026-09-27; 14 families across 7 offices), followed by one family entry as it appears in the issue.
Four synchronous-reluctance rotor grants landed in one month. Gree took one in Europe (EP-3739724-B1). A Japanese grant, JP-7905443-B2, sits in a Gree family, though the JP record itself names no applicant. Schaeffler took one in Europe (EP-4662766-B1) on rotor work that started at Vitesco. The Korea Electrotechnology Research Institute took one in Korea (KR-103010483-B1). Reluctance machines, with or without assisting magnets, are moving from applications to granted claims in both traction and compressor motors. Gree now holds granted rotor claims in the US, Europe and Japan. On the materials side the month belongs to substitution rather than elimination. Yonsei's twin Korean grants put cerium in place of part of the neodymium. A Chinese application drops dysprosium and terbium from sintered NdFeB. LG Innotek claims ruthenium as the third element in MnBi. Iron nitride appears once, as a Chinese production-line application with no named owner.
Rotor structure, permanent magnet assisted synchronous reluctance motor, and electric car
EP-3739724-B1 · published 2026-09-09 · priority 2018-05-08 · Gree Electric Appliances Inc Zhuhai · offices: EP, US
EP-3739724-B1 is the European grant to Gree Electric Appliances for a permanent-magnet-assisted synchronous reluctance rotor for electric cars. The rotor body carries inner and outer layers of magnet slots spaced radially. The EP record carries no abstract; this description follows the abstract of the US member, US-11456634-B2, which is already granted. Magnet-assisted reluctance rotors are a main route to cutting rare-earth content in traction and compressor motors.
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How these numbers are made
Publications come from the EPO Open Patent Services and Google Patents Public Data, matched against a published CPC and keyword scope, and grouped by DOCDB patent family. Each count above is a family count unless it says publications. Applicant names are the harmonised names in the source record. The full methodology is on the methodology page.