The increasing complexities in the development of new fire-protective coatings hinder the attraction of private investments and impede the progress of innovation. The review provides an overall picture of the research and specifically illustrates the extraordinary diversity of their directions and explains the inherent reason for such diversity. The goal of this review is to establish an information foundation for a critical analysis of the feasibility of private investments in developments in this field and to show some possible ways. The wide range of choices for specific components in fire-protective coatings and the diversity of mechanisms they employ result in a factorial number of possible combinations. The variety of properties of these components and the complexity of their interactions make it difficult to assess the outcomes of their selection unequivocally without conducting experiments during the development of new materials. Therefore, confident prediction of the results of new research is extremely challenging. As a consequence, there is a broad spectrum of directions and sub-directions in ongoing developments. Summing up the results of these investigations is further complicated by the difficulty of testing materials for aging parameters and resistance to external influences. The wide range of choices for specific components in fire-protective coatings and the diversity of mechanisms they employ result in a factorial number of possible combinations. The diverse properties of these components and the complexity of their interactions prevent a definitive evaluation of the results of their inclusion in the composition prior to conducting experiments in the development of new materials. Therefore, confident forecasting of the results of new research is extremely challenging. As a consequence, there is a broad range of directions and sub-directions in ongoing developments. Summing up the results of these investigations is further complicated by the difficulty of testing materials for aging parameters and resistance to external influences. The high uncertainty in forecasting the prospects of specific developments stimulates the advancement of simulation methods for compositions and coating manufacturing technologies, as well as the prediction of their effectiveness, etc. However, these methods only provide a partial increase in the reliability of expectations. A more thorough execution of a feasibility study is recommended to substantiate venture investments. One of the additional approaches capable of enhancing its credibility is the utilization of non-traditional specialized methods for researching patent information.

Keywords: fire-protective coatings, specifically illustrates the extraordinary diversity, prospects of specific developments stimulates, simulation methods for compositions and coating manufacturing technologies