CATL, the world’s largest battery maker, has 12 US patents on perovskite solar cell fabrication. The manufacturing DNA is nearly identical. A 48,000-paper field is about to meet the factory floor.
Two patent clusters that barely knew about each other in 2000 — footwear and consumer electronics — have closed 16% of their distance by 2025. Nike has been patenting sensor-embedded sneakers at the rate of a mid-sized electronics company. Apple has three of its own.