ABSTRACT
In spite of a great extent of development and advancement in the field of surface technology, the phenomenon of surface activity of a chemical is still a key concern to industries all over the world. The surfactants find its application as an essential item in many industries such as industrial and institutional cleaners, soaps and detergents, petroleum industry, home care, personal care, elastomers and plastics, food, pharmaceuticals, crop protection and textiles. Global surfactants market size is worth many billion USD right now and it is going to be many folds in the coming decade. The growth of detergents, and oilfield chemicals owing to rapidly increasing exploration and production activities in the United States and China, and growing demand for biosurfactants in developed economies are the reasons for the spectacular growth in surfactant industry. This chapter presents a panorama of the surfactant industry constructed with the use of patent applications worldwide. Information from patent documents was retrieved using databases, yielding 760,231 documents for the period of 2010–2020. The information within this chapter is not merely a technical description of technologies; it includes data regarding the assignee, year of application, countries where the patents have been applied and the technical sector of the usage.
