The European Patent Office (EPO) states that over the past 15 years, China has surpassed all other countries in photovoltaic (PV) patent applications, while European startups and universities maintain leadership in agrivoltaics and niche solar applications.
According to the EPO’s Patent and Technology Observatory, PV technology innovations have grown more than 17-fold over the last three decades. The office’s technology insight report analyzed 50-year trends across 30 technologies, examining 340,000 inventions – including 70,000 international patent families (IPFs) – covering PV materials, PV devices, and their management and application fields.
The report indicates that Japanese companies are the top applicants for IPFs, by firms from the United States, South Korea, Germany, and France. Leading Chinese innovators were notably absent from the rankings as they primarily focus on domestic patent filings.
The EPO highlights that while device technologies played a pivotal role between 1990 and 2023 (accounting for 78% of all inventions), other subfields have steadily gained importance in recent years. From 2020 to 2023, approximately half (48%) of PV inventions related to device technologies, by applications (25%), PV materials (17%), and device management (10%).
Patent activity has increasingly shifted to China over the past 15 years. Despite a decline in international patent families since 2012, the EPO notes that China’s patent applications have surged nearly sixfold since 2010. By 2022, China accounted for 80% of the world’s new PV invention patents.
About Xiamen Sunforson Power Co., Ltd.
Embodying a spirit of breakthrough innovation, Xiamen Sunforson Power continues to pioneer the design of practical PV mounting systems and holds multiple design patents.
Our current product portfolio includes:
• Flat roof mounting systems
• Sloped roof mounting systems
• Ground-mounted structures
• Solar carport solutions
