For years, the electric vehicle (EV) industry was defined by rapid technological innovation. Automakers competed aggressively on battery range, charging speed, and vehicle performance, while charging providers raced to build the infrastructure necessary to support a growing EV market.
As EV adoption accelerated globally, patent activity surrounding EV charging technologies surged alongside it, reflecting efforts to solve the foundational engineering and infrastructure challenges tied to large-scale electrification.
Patent filings during this period captured a broad range of innovation activity, including charging hardware, connector systems, thermal management, fast-charging technologies, communication protocols, and network deployment systems. The pace of innovation reflected both the urgency of scaling EV infrastructure and the fragmentation of the early charging ecosystem, where competing charging standards and uneven network performance created significant operational and consumer challenges.
However, recent patent data suggests the market may be entering a different phase.
To better understand how innovation in EV charging is evolving, we spoke with Justin Philpott, a partner at Banner Witcoff, who shared his perspectives on the technological and commercial developments shaping the sector. Combined with patent filing data, these insights provide a useful lens through which to examine the current state of EV charging innovation.
The EV Charging Patent Landscape
Our analysis of CPC Y02T 90/12, covering electric charging stations, indicates that global patent activity accelerated rapidly during the early buildout phase of EV charging infrastructure before peaking in 2020 and moderating thereafter.
Worldwide filings increased from 1,748 patent filings in 2015 to a peak of 4,635 filings in 2020, reflecting a period of aggressive innovation. Following this peak, filing activity declined steadily, reaching 1,695 filings by 2024 despite continued growth in global EV adoption and ongoing investment in charging infrastructure deployment.
It should be noted however, that patent counts in recent years are subject to publication lag, particularly in the U.S., where applications are typically published 18 months after filing. Our data also involves “active” (i.e. granted and pending) patent assets, and excludes those that are lapsed, expired, or revoked.
EV Charging: U.S. Patent Landscape
U.S. patent activity broadly mirrors the global landscape. The pattern may suggest that the EV charging market, both in the U.S. and globally, may be transitioning away from foundational infrastructure buildout and early-stage experimentation toward a more mature phase focused on interoperability, charging reliability, operational efficiency, and network optimization.
The trend is not isolated to EV charging stations alone. Similar filing patterns can also be observed across related EV charging and interoperability technologies, including Y02T 90/14 (Plug-in electric vehicles), Y02T 90/16 (ICT improving the operation of electric vehicles), and Y02T 90/167 (Power network operation and communication technologies supporting EV interoperability).
Across these categories, patent activity accelerated sharply during the late 2010s before moderating in the years that followed. We see however, that patent filings in Y02T 90/14 (Plug-in electric vehicles) were sustained longer, remaining with higher levels of filing activity until 2022, before eventually slowing down in the following years.
Does the decline in filing activity indicate that innovation itself has stalled? Or does it reflect a market evolving and increasingly shifting toward standardization?
Conversations with Justin Philpott
To explore these questions further, we spoke with Justin Philpott, a Partner at Banner Witcoff, who previously wrote about EV charging infrastructure and patent trends. Justin’s IP practice spans climate tech, clean energy, electric vehicles (EVs), and green technologies.
We discuss how the market has evolved over the past few years and whether the recent patent trends reflect a slowdown in innovation, a shift in technological priorities, or the growing maturation of the EV charging ecosystem.
Q: In your earlier article, you mentioned that patents may actually help accelerate innovation in EV charging. How do you see intellectual property influencing the future development of charging technologies?
A: Intellectual property, in general, continues to be an increasingly significant proportion of an overall value of a business, and its importance for EV charging technologies is much like it is for any other industry.
Patents are often a reflection of where investments are made in R&D, and companies tend to pursue patent protection in areas where they may see they can have competitive advantages. In a way, patents can serve both as indicators of where technology is heading (oftentimes before commercialization happens), and as driving forces for accelerating innovation by disclosing to the public concepts that can be further improved upon by others.
Q: Does the decline in EV charging patent filings simply indicate slowing innovation, or a transition toward market maturation and standardization?
A: For US patent filings in EV charging, we have to factor in the 18-month publication delay, so it is still unclear whether a declining trend in EV charging patent filings that we observed from the early 2020s (after an initial peak) is going to continue through 2025-2026.
Depending on the metric being used (e.g., application date, publication date, country, deduplicated counts across patent families, etc.), declining numbers may have momentarily reverted in at least some instances. For example, now that we have cleared the 18-month publication delay window through 2023, we can see that, in the US, issued patents and published applications collectively were slightly increased in 2023 relative to 2022 for Y02T 90/12.
That said, by many metrics, there does appear to be a general global decline in patent filings specifically relating to EV charging in some recent years. In either case, I would not interpret such a decline as a slowing of innovation. Rather, with more recent patent filings, I think we could be seeing somewhat of a shift in the specific types of technologies being emphasized in patent filings that ultimately impact EV charging.
Q: Do we expect companies to shift innovation efforts away from charging hardware and toward software coordination, interoperability, and energy management systems?
A: I think we are already starting to see some of this shift. In the early 2020s and prior, we saw a greater percentage of patent filings in things like hardware and the physical design of EV chargers than we have seen in recent years.
Lately, we are seeing more patent publications in areas such as AI/ML-driven optimization, predictive battery conditioning, security and safety, and a general focus on system-level improvements. I think we can expect that the trend towards system-level innovations in EV charging-related technology will continue in the coming years.
Q: How has the rapid adoption of NACS reshaped the competitive landscape for EV charging technologies?
A: With the standardization of hardware, such as the NACS connector, companies may be encouraged to innovate in other areas in order to improve the EV charging experience.
For example, before the NACS connector was standardized, companies had patented hardware-based features, such as adapters to convert between different connectors and systems that integrate multiple connectors—innovations that will become less necessary as time goes on. While we may be in a transitional period for the next decade or so, with most pre-2025 non-Tesla EVs on the road in the US requiring a physical adapter to use a NACS-based charging systems, future R&D can move past these connector issues and focus more on other aspects for improving EV charging.
Q: How would you characterize Banner Witcoff’s work in the EV charging space, and what kinds of innovations are you seeing most often from companies in this area?
A: Accelerating. While my comments here are limited to what is disclosed in issued patents, for some of these issued patents we have worked in the EV charging space on things like charger hardware, power conversion and distribution, power control for battery preservation, vehicle-to-grid technology, optimization for home EV charging systems, EV charger diagnostic systems, and safety features. I expect our work to expand into other areas as EV charging innovations evolve.
NACS adoption drives charging standardization
One of the clearest examples of this broader industry transition is the rapid adoption of the North American Charging Standard (NACS).
Before 2022, the U.S. EV charging landscape remained highly fragmented. Multiple connector standards, including CCS, CHAdeMO, and Tesla’s proprietary connector, coexisted across networks, while inconsistent charging reliability and limited interoperability created friction for EV drivers. Tesla’s Supercharger network maintained a significant advantage in uptime and user experience, while many third-party charging networks struggled with reliability, software integration, and maintenance consistency.
A major turning point came in late 2022 when Tesla opened its North American Charging Standard (NACS) connector design to other automakers and charging providers. The decision accelerated adoption of a common charging interface and contributed to SAE International standardizing NACS as SAE J3400.
Most major automakers, including Ford, General Motors, Hyundai, Kia, Honda, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Toyota, Volkswagen Group, Rivian, Volvo, and Nissan, subsequently announced plans to adopt NACS compatibility.
The growing consolidation around a common charging standard provides important context for the broader patent trends seen across EV charging technologies. As portions of the charging ecosystem mature and interoperability becomes increasingly prioritized, competitive differentiation may be shifting away from foundational charging hardware and toward software integration, charging reliability, utilization efficiency, and network management.
Software-defined charging infrastructure
At the same time, the EV charging industry is shifting from rapid network expansion toward improving operational performance as utilization rates remain relatively low. A 2025 study published in the World Electric Vehicle Journal reported global charging station utilization rates of roughly 20% to 40%, with operators increasingly prioritizing charger uptime, utilization efficiency, predictive maintenance, seamless authentication, cybersecurity, and integrated software platforms to improve profitability and customer retention.
The study found that integrating charging infrastructure into connected digital platforms significantly improved utilization rates by optimizing charging availability, reducing queue times, and enabling real-time operational management. These are areas that increasingly rely on software coordination and interoperability rather than purely hardware-driven innovation.
Patent activity and major filers
Toyota Motor leads global filings with 1,798 patent fillings, followed by Hyundai Motor with 1,394 and Kia with 1,209. The concentration of filings among automakers reflects how charging infrastructure has become a strategic extension of vehicle platforms, battery systems, and software ecosystems rather than a standalone utility function.
Toyota Motor’s leadership reflects its long-term focus on electrification, energy management, charging interoperability, and vehicle-grid integration across hybrid, plug-in hybrid, battery electric, and hydrogen vehicle platforms. The company has committed more than €11.6 billion toward battery, electric motor, and power control unit development through 2030 while pursuing broad patent coverage around charging control systems, thermal management, battery endurance, and integrated mobility infrastructure. Toyota has also prioritized next-generation technologies including solid-state batteries, targeting lower battery costs, improved energy efficiency, longer driving range, and faster charging performance as EV adoption scales globally.
Hyundai Motor and Kia have accelerated patent activity alongside the expansion of their E-GMP EV platform, 800V fast-charging systems, and software-defined vehicle strategies. Their combined filing strength demonstrates how vertically integrated automotive groups are increasingly treating charging speed, infrastructure integration, and digital user experience as core competitive advantages in the global EV market.
U.S. patent filings under CPC Y02T 90/12 closely mirror the global EV charging patent landscape, with Toyota Motor, Hyundai Motor, and Kia leading both rankings, highlighting the dominance of Asian OEMs in charging, battery, and energy management technologies.
What’s ahead
The decline in EV charging patent filings does not necessarily indicate that innovation is slowing. Rather, the patent data, industry standardization efforts, and expert perspectives examined here suggest that EV charging may be entering a new phase of development.
As standards such as NACS reduce fragmentation across the charging ecosystem, innovation appears increasingly focused on software coordination, network optimization, energy management, reliability, and system-level performance. The next generation of EV charging technologies may therefore be defined less by connector design and charging hardware, and more by the intelligence, interoperability, and efficiency of the networks that support them.
