From the people behind the last great waveform.
The multicarrier idea that Dr. Michel Fattouche helped pioneer in the early 1990s now carries much of the world's wireless traffic. MTF is what he did next: a new physical layer, a decade in the making, built in Canada and the US.
W-OFDM
Wideband OFDM, co-invented by Dr. Fattouche and commercialised by Wi-LAN. It was adopted in IEEE 802.16a and licensed by more than 200 companies.
MTF
A patented spreading core that leaves the radio's conventional signal in place and changes what the physical layer can deliver: range on less power, more bits per hertz, or raw throughput.
Dr. Michel Fattouche
Emeritus Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Schulich School of Engineering, University of Calgary. M.A.Sc. and Ph.D., University of Toronto.
Dr. Fattouche co-founded Wi-LAN in 1993 on his work in wideband OFDM, which was adopted in the IEEE 802.16a "WirelessMAN" standard. In 1995 he co-founded Cell-Loc, a pioneer of network-based wireless location, with deployments in Canada and Brazil.
His inventions have been licensed by more than 200 companies worldwide. He holds 26 issued patents and was named Ernst & Young's Prairies Entrepreneur of the Year in 2000.
Full résumé (PDF) →We license. You build. We never compete.
MTFComm is an R&D and licensing company, the same model that took W-OFDM worldwide. We don't build radios, so we never compete with the companies that do.
Technical briefing
A deep dive with our engineers, under NDA.
Joint evaluation
Reach or Velocity FPGA images on your own RFSoC bench.
Proof of concept
A sponsored PoC or co-development in your band and application.
Licence
A licence for your chips, radios, satellites or networks.
Questions we hear most.
What is MTF, in one line?
A patented physical-layer waveform. Same airwaves: data goes farther, faster, and on less power. MTF stands for mask-matched, time-limited coding with finite access time.
Is this 5G or 6G?
Neither. It sits underneath them. MTF replaces the waveform at the physical layer, the step where bits become a radio signal, and leaves the protocols above it alone. It can make Wi-Fi, cellular, satellite and point-to-point links better.
Do I need new spectrum, towers or radios?
No new spectrum or towers. MTF is mask-matched to the regulator's rules for the band you already use, and keeps a conventional signal at its core, so existing coding, framing and MAC stay as they are. Radios need a new PHY: in an FPGA or DSP today, and in silicon later.
How is it different from OFDM?
Three ways. MTF Core spreads the signal into a mask-matched, time-limited frame. In Reach and Spectra a second patented stage makes the envelope constant (0 dB PAPR), so the amplifier runs saturated instead of backed off, and adds up to 7.3 dB of SNR gain. The receiver then uses iterative interference cancellation (MMSE-SIC) to separate the deliberately overlapped symbols.
Which configuration do I need?
Reach if power, range, battery life or jamming is the problem: drones, satellites, IoT, HF. Spectra if spectrum is the constraint: cellular, Wi-Fi, fixed wireless access. Velocity if you have signal to spare and need raw rate: backhaul, point-to-point, in-room links.
Is it real, or a lab idea?
Real. Reach and Velocity run 100% in FPGA on AMD Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC boards, transmitter and receiver, decoding over a board-to-board RF link. The science is peer-reviewed in IEEE Systems Journal, and the patents are granted in the US, Europe, China, Japan, Korea, Australia and Taiwan.
What do "Measured" and "Simulated" mean on this site?
Measured results come from MTF running on hardware. Simulated results come from our system models, which include real-world impairments. Application figures such as range and jammer margin are simulated until they are trialled over the air with partners.
Does MTF violate the Shannon limit?
No. Information theory isn't broken. MTF works the channel in a different regime, time-limited and mask-matched, from the one conventional capacity comparisons assume. The IEEE paper sets out the analysis.
Is it secure against jamming and detection?
Reach is built for contested links. In its most robust setting it survives a jammer about 50 times its own power, level with the best of today's control links, and hopping while hidden takes that to about 2,500 times in analysis. Tone and sweep jammers are removed outright. These are simulation results; hopping is not yet built.
How does MTFComm make money?
Licensing, the playbook the founder ran with W-OFDM. The technology is licensed into the chips and systems of companies that build phones, networks, satellites and defence equipment.
Can I evaluate it?
Yes. Qualified partners can receive the technical briefing, application briefs and FPGA images for Reach and Velocity under NDA. Request access →
Talk to the team.
Engineers, operators, integrators and investors: we'd like to hear what you're building.