everything RF recently interviewed Leo Matytsine, the Vice President and Co-founder at MatSing. With a background in engineering and business, he has been central to developing and commercializing the company’s patented RF lens antenna technology. Leo leads global strategy, operations, and product direction, helping position MatSing as a key player in wireless infrastructure for venues, events and macro networks.
Q. Can you give us an overview of MatSing, including when the company was founded, how it started, and the vision behind developing its antenna technologies?
Leo Matysine: MatSing is the pioneer and global leader in RF lens antenna technology. We were founded in Singapore in 2005 by my father, Dr Serguei Matitsine, with a very clear goal: to create RF Lenses for different communication applications. We were inspired by the theory of RF Lenses (and specifically Luneburg Lenses) as an approach for creating new types of antennas. Although the theory for RF lenses has been around for years, no one has been able to solve fundamental challenges (such as the material the lenses are made from) to make this technology work for broad use in communications. From the beginning, the focus was on using fundamental physics to approach the problem differently, which led to the development of our meta-material and spherical lens technology.
Lens-based antennas represent a distinct departure from traditional architectures and provide a fundamentally different physics approach to traditional Dish or array antennas. By enabling multiple highly isolated beams from a single antenna, it’s an ideal solution for creating high-performance, truly multi-beam antennas and delivering meaningful improvements in capacity, coverage, and spectral efficiency. This performance advantage has been central to our approach from the beginning.
What began as a family-led innovation has since evolved into a global antenna platform, with deployments across major venues, urban networks, and macro infrastructure worldwide. While the company has grown significantly, our core philosophy remains unchanged: to solve complex challenges through physics, engineering and deliver unique and more efficient, high-performance network solutions.
Q. What drove the development of MatSing’s spherical RF lens antenna, and how does it help meet growing cellular network demands?
Leo Matysine: The theory for Luneburg Lens antennas (which is a spherical lens-based antenna) has been around as early as the 1940s and we were inspired by this concept as an alternative approach to traditional dish antennas or array antennas for focusing radio waves. It is fundamentally a different physics approach for creating an antenna that has many benefits for creating multiple independent beams from the same antenna. Although the theory has been around for many years, nobody was able to truly create this technology largely due to a lack of materials required to build such lenses. Our first step was to create, develop and patent a new type of meta-material that allowed us to create these lenses and use the technology for different antenna applications.
MatSing Lens AntennaWe loved the idea of a new type of antenna that can create many broadband beams from a single antenna (and in essence replace multiple dish or array antennas), allowing for more efficient communication infrastructure. As the lenses are able to create multiple independent, high-gain, broadband beams from the same antenna, we saw this as a natural fit for telecommunications and the growing capacity and performance demands on cellular networks. As smartphones became more prominent and data usage grew, there was a major strain on cellular networks to keep up with capacity demands, which traditional array antennas were struggling to do. Using a lens, it’s possible to create multiple independent sectors from the same antenna, which was a perfect fit for solving capacity problems while also using fewer antennas and cell sites.
By using a lens to naturally form multiple beams, we were able to create a passive architecture that delivers high capacity and strong performance without the overhead associated with deploying many new cell sites or using active systems.
Q. For readers who may not be familiar with lens antennas, can you explain the operating principle of MatSing’s spherical RF lens antenna and how it generates multiple independent beams?
Leo Matysine: Lens antennas focus radio waves through refraction, unlike traditional dish antennas, which focus waves through reflection or array antennas that use constructive and destructive interference. This represents a fundamentally different approach and, in many ways, works like the human eye, which also uses a lens to refract and focus light waves.
Nature is the greatest engineer, and we thought that this approach of using a lens to refract and focus RF waves provided an ideal solution for communications. In particular, the ability to focus multiple waves independently. Just as your eye can focus light from multiple directions simultaneously, a spherical RF lens can focus RF signals to and from multiple directions at once. In essence, a single lens can receive and transmit multiple independent signals (with high isolation) across multiple directions simultaneously. In other words, instead of using multiple dish antennas pointed in different directions, one lens can be used.
One of the keys to our materials and RF lenses is also their broadband capabilities. A single lens can generate multiple independent beams for different frequencies, replacing the need to use multiple different antennas to cover different frequency bands and create different sectors.
Furthermore, with our spherical lenses, to create a beam, a single radiating element can be used, eliminating the need for complex design architecture, dividers, combiners and other electronics. This element can be moved around the perimeter of the lens to move the resulting beam, allowing for functions such as independent beam tilt or individual beam tracking capabilities for satellites, without having to physically move the antenna or adjust the phase of the beam, which results in beam degradation.
The result is a broadband system that can deliver higher capacity and more consistent performance while using fewer antennas, particularly in dense environments where interference is a limiting factor.
Because this is achieved through the physical design of the antenna rather than active processing, it also reduces complexity while maintaining strong performance.
Q. How does the performance of lens-based antennas compare with conventional sector antennas or phased-array beamforming in terms of coverage, capacity, and spectral efficiency?
Leo Matysine: Compared to traditional panel antennas, lens-based systems enable significantly higher capacity through increased sectorization, as we are easily able to create multiple sectors through the same antenna.
One key distinction is the fundamentally different way a lens antenna creates beams. Unlike array multi-beam antennas, lens antennas have very high isolation beam to beam (as each beam is truly independent from the other – none of the radiating elements are shared. This becomes critical for sectorization as it increases signal dominance for each beam.
Further lenses provide good side-lobe/back-lobe suppression across the whole coverage area; our antennas typically provide 120 degrees of coverage. This, in essence, means cleaner RF and that the signal goes where you want it to without spilling over and creating interference to other sectors. Unlike traditional antennas, since the RF lens is spherical, all beams are effectively “boresight” regardless of the angle. There is no beam degradation as you move away from boresight since you are not using phase adjustments to steer the beam or “create” the beams angled away from boresight. All this leads to better coverage, capacity and performance.
In regard to spectral efficiency, lens antennas inherently provide much better spectral efficiency as they provide cleaner RF (better signal quality) and high sectorization, allowing customers to re-use spectrum more often. Furthermore, since our antennas are broadband and allow for MIMO and multiple ports per beam, different customers can share the same antenna, further reducing antenna infrastructure while providing customers with high performance and capacity.
These advantages are based on the fact that lenses work on a different approach to phased-array antennas (whether conventional sector antennas or phased array beam forming antennas). Whether multiple fixed beams are created by a phased-array antenna, or a single beam that is steered (beam forming), the drawbacks of beam degradation as you move away from boresight, increased sidelobes and reduced beamwidth stability still exist. The lens architecture avoids these issues and results in lower cost (by using fewer antennas), reduced power consumption (efficient RF), and less system complexity.
Q. Can you give us an overview of MatSing’s antenna portfolio and the key product families designed to support modern wireless deployments such as cellular networks, private networks, and large venues?
Leo Matysine: Our portfolio has evolved alongside the needs of the market, but fundamentally, we have continued to use RF lenses as the core technology behind our antennas. We initially saw strong adoption in large venues and events where tremendous capacity was needed (with many narrow beam high-gain sectors covering a single area).
For this, we used larger spheres that focus the RF more and provide more narrow high gain beams. We later introduced similar antennas for stadium applications, where we were able to add multiple rows of beams (for example, 2 rows of 6 or 4 rows of 12 resulting in a 48-beam antenna. This was a novel approach that allowed stadiums to use fewer antennas (significantly reducing construction and deployment costs) while providing high sectorization.
Building on that foundation, we expanded into macro network infrastructure with the introduction of our MBA product line, designed to bring multi-beam capabilities into more traditional cellular deployments. In essence, our MBA and Macro antennas are more miniaturized versions, using smaller lenses to create multiple broadband beams ideal for cell tower deployments. More recently, we’ve introduced cylindrical lens antennas to our MBC line, which offers narrow vertical beams with more gain in an even more compact and cost-efficient form factor ideal for dense urban macro deployments.
Overall, while using the same key lens technology, we have now created a large portfolio of antennas (over 100+ models ranging from single beam to 48-beams per antenna and everything in between) based on the combination needed by a particular deployment; how many beams are required, what frequency bands are needed, size, and 2x2, 4x4, 8x8 MIMO requirements.
In parallel, we’ve extended the same principles into Wi-Fi with our MS-16.16W45 antenna, applying multi-beam architectures to unlicensed spectrum environments where we see the same inherent capacity, interference and performance challenges.
Across all of these product lines, the underlying objective remains consistent: deliver higher performance through more efficient use of RF energy.
Q. Can you tell us more about the antennas you have developed for Wi-Fi deployments in high-density environments. What design challenges arise in these scenarios, and how do your Wi-Fi antennas address them?
Leo Matysine: High-density Wi-Fi environments are fundamentally constrained by interference and limited spectrum. As user density increases, performance degradation is often driven as much by overlapping signals as by raw congestion. Like cellular, there is also the fundamental challenge of sectorization, creating more sectors to meet growing capacity.
Using traditional Wi-Fi antenna technology, this can mean placing thousands of small omnidirectional antennas throughout a stadium, which can not only lead to an optimization nightmare of the antennas not interfering with each other, but is also extremely costly in terms of construction.
Our approach addresses this spatially. By using lens technology to create narrower, more directional beams from a single antenna, we can reduce overlap between coverage areas and enable more effective reuse of available spectrum. Similar to our cellular stadium deployments, hundreds of sectors can be created from a handful of antenna locations.
This allows networks to serve a greater number of users simultaneously while maintaining more consistent performance, without requiring additional spectrum or significantly increasing infrastructure.
Q. Where have MatSing antennas been deployed globally, and what types of environments - such as stadiums, transportation hubs, or dense urban networks - benefit most from your technology?
Leo Matysine: Our technology has been deployed in some of the most demanding wireless environments globally. Early deployments, such as the 2014 Coachella Music Festival, demonstrated the ability to handle extremely high data demand in dense, temporary settings.
Since then, we’ve expanded into permanent installations across a wide range of environments. This includes most of the outdoor festivals and events, major stadiums across the world (such as AT&T Stadium and Allegiant Stadium, and Amalie Arena) as well as macro everyday cell sites.
Today, our systems are deployed in approximately 70% of NFL stadiums and 50% of NBA arenas, in addition to global events such as Formula 1 races and the Paris Olympics. We’ve also supported fixed wireless deployments at scale in markets such as Australia and South Africa.
More broadly, we work with customers across 24 countries, including mobile network operators, neutral hosts, and private network providers.
These environments share a common characteristic: very high user density combined with the expectation of seamless connectivity. More recently, we’ve extended into macro network deployments, where similar capacity and performance challenges are increasingly present in everyday network infrastructure across the U.S and the rest of the world.
Q. Which industries and customers typically deploy MatSing antennas today? Are your primary customers mobile network operators, infrastructure vendors, system integrators, or enterprise network providers?
Leo Matysine: We operate within the broader wireless ecosystem, working primarily with mobile network operators, often in collaboration with system integrators and infrastructure partners, depending on the deployment.
We support customers across 24 countries, including mobile network operators, neutral hosts, and private network providers. These deployments span a wide range of environments, from large-scale venues and events to enterprise and macro network infrastructure.
Across these segments, the underlying challenge is often the same: very high user density combined with the expectation of seamless connectivity. As a result, we are seeing increasing adoption not only in traditional public networks, but also in private and enterprise environments where capacity and performance requirements are becoming equally demanding. Fundamentally, our antennas are passive and work with any type of radio equipment, allowing customers to deploy them across all types of networks.
Q. What factors do network operators consider when integrating MatSing antennas into their wireless infrastructure, and how does your team support network planning and deployment?
Leo Matysine: At the end of the day, our antennas can be deployed like any other passive base-station antenna; however, as this is a different technology, we are very hands-on to do anything we can to educate and assist our customers about our products and how best to deploy them. We want to make sure customers understand and are comfortable with our products and get the most from the technology.
We support this process through RF modeling, planning tools, and close collaboration with our partners. While this may sometimes require more upfront work with new customers and engineers who have not used our technology, after one or two deployments, customers feel very comfortable using the products and are able to deploy them quickly.
The overall outcome is a shift from incremental optimization to more intentional, performance-driven network design.
Q. MatSing has been a pioneer in spherical RF lens antenna technology. As more companies enter the lens antenna market, how does MatSing differentiate its approach and maintain a competitive advantage?
Leo Matysine: Our differentiation is rooted in both our technical foundation and our deployment history.
From a technology perspective, we pioneered the use of RF lens antennas in telecommunications and have a long (20+ years) and deep background of not only designing and developing meta-materials but also RF Lens antennas. Our extensive R&D over this time is complemented by 70+ patents and the core of our company is a continued long-term investment in research and development. This isn’t an adaptation of existing antenna designs, but a fundamentally different approach that uses fundamentally different physics from traditional antennas.
We also have real-world validation. Our technology has been deployed at scale across a wide range of high-demand environments, demonstrating consistent performance in scenarios where reliability and capacity are critical. One of our key principles in our company is to focus on real results (whether in science or in business). We consistently continue to create prototypes and new innovations not just in cellular but in satellite and other communication fields.
This combination of foundational innovation and proven results continues to distinguish us as the market evolves and others begin to explore similar concepts.
Q. MatSing is a privately held company. How does being privately owned influence your approach to innovation, long-term technology development, and customer partnerships?
Leo Matysine: Being privately held has allowed us to take a long-term approach to innovation. Rather than focusing on short-term market cycles, we’ve been able to invest consistently in foundational areas such as materials science and RF design.
This has also enabled closer collaboration with customers, particularly in complex deployments where iteration and customization are often required. This has resulted in a more deliberate development process, aligned with long-term performance and customer outcomes. At the core of it, we are able to continue to invest in new R&D ideas and stay focused on new technology and new solutions that we can use to solve problems, even when some of those ideas are not commercialized in the short-term. We love to innovate, experiment and bring new solutions to the market.
Q. As wireless networks continue to evolve toward higher capacity and new standards, what areas of antenna technology is MatSing focusing on for the next generation of products?
Leo Matysine: Our focus is on extending the core principles of lens-based technology into new formats and broader applications.
Some of our recent developments, such as cylindrical lens antennas, reflect an effort to make the technology more practical and scalable for widespread macro deployment. Our new Wi-Fi antennas are also aimed to provide the same fundamental benefits of Lens antennas to the world of Wi-Fi. We are also working on some new and very promising R&D aimed at further improving throughput and capacity, which we hope to reveal very soon. Outside of telecom, we are continuing to develop some exciting solutions for satellite communications.
Our objective remains the same: to deliver new solutions to solve key problems with greater network performance through more efficient, physics-driven infrastructure.
About Matsing:
MatSing is a provider of advanced RF antenna solutions, specializing in patented multi-beam lens antennas for wireless communication networks. Its spherical lens technology enables wide-area coverage and precise beamforming using a single antenna, reducing infrastructure complexity. The company’s solutions are widely used in 4G LTE and 5G deployments, particularly in high-density environments such as stadiums, airports, and urban areas. MatSing antennas are designed to improve spectral efficiency, enhance network capacity, and lower total cost of ownership. It works closely with network operators and system integrators to support next-generation connectivity requirements.
