It looks like a simple, regularly-shaped, symmetrical object. Black and round. That's what it seems. But inside, the tyre hides a complex soul, made of formulas, ingredients, materials and details that make it a unique and technologically advanced item. At Pirelli, thousands of people work every day on tyres, striving to make them more sustainable, better performing and safer. And these are precisely the objectives underpinning the patents filed every year by the company at the EPO, the European Patent Office in Munich, which have allowed Pirelli to find a place on the podium once again, with 47 patent applications, ranked as the second largest Italian company in 2022 to have filed the largest number of patents.
Patents were filed in several areas in 2022, but almost all follow a very specific direction, namely sustainable innovation. Vegetable oils such as new plasticisers and naturally occurring polymers. As well as new textile and metal reinforcements to improve mileage, reduce tyre weight, reduce noise and reduce rolling resistance. It is therefore the search for new materials and innovative tyre components that drives Pirelli's patent applications in 2022, together with raising awareness and the continuous development of innovative processes which began several years ago with the MIRS.
“One of the areas in which Pirelli filed the largest number of patents in 2022 is tyre structure, which includes metal and textile reinforcements, in addition to the compound,” commented Sergio Lasca, Head of IP, Patents and Know-how at Pirelli. “This means that although several materials used in the tyre are purchased from external suppliers, they are now the subject of specific research work aimed at achieving the challenging objectives that Pirelli has set itself in the field of green innovation and sustainability, and that means we are engaged together with our partners and several universities.”
It is also thanks to the collaboration with Italian and international universities, research centres and specialist suppliers that Pirelli can now boast 695 patent families which are active for a total of around 5,900 patents, and is at the forefront of the search for innovative materials which will be used for future tyre construction, set to be increasingly made of recycled materials and fewer fossil fuel materials. The challenge is twofold: not only in terms of environmental friendliness, but also in terms of performance levels. Indeed, tyres for new electric vehicles have to withstand higher loads (due to the weight of the batteries), have a lower ‘rolling resistance', offering superior grip with less noise. In order to succeed, the tread design, the composition of the compound and the possibility of testing new products thanks to Pirelli's state-of-the-art simulators will all allow Pirelli to make significant progress on the road to research and innovation.
