For Jelson Mateus, the most important engineering work often happens before anyone asks for it.
As Deputy R&D Manager at Identiv, Mateus spends a significant portion of his time exploring ideas that may not become products for years – running antenna simulations, studying white papers, and experimenting with new architectures for ultra-thin IoT labels. That research often sits quietly in the background until a customer problem appears that suddenly makes it relevant.
“Research gives you answers before the questions arrive,” Mateus said. “Without research, development eventually runs out of road.”
That mindset defines his role at Identiv. Mateus leads the development of advanced IoT labels that combine technologies like BLE and RFID into flexible, adhesive tags that can attach to almost anything – from large shipping containers to ultra-compact pharmaceutical packaging.
But these devices are far more complex than they appear.
“They’re essentially electrical labels,” Mateus said. “An antenna system powered by a chip that you can attach to a physical object. Once you start adding multiple components, the engineering becomes much more sophisticated.”
When a Label Becomes a System
Many RFID labels are built around a straightforward architecture – typically just a chip connected to an antenna. For many applications, that simple design provides exactly what organizations need: a reliable way to identify and track items.
Increasingly, however, organizations are looking to gain deeper insights from the products and assets they tag. As a result, label designs have had to evolve to support new capabilities.
Many IoT labels now integrate multiple components, miniature circuits, and sensors, all embedded inside thin, flexible materials. That shift changes the engineering challenge.
“You’re no longer just designing an antenna,” Mateus explained. “You’re designing a complete system.”
Electrical engineering intersects with mechanical constraints. The adhesive, substrate, and protective materials that form the label can influence the antenna’s electrical performance.
“The material itself becomes part of the design,” he said. “Even the label properties can affect how the antenna behaves.”
Once a design works in the lab, another challenge emerges: turning it into something that can be manufactured reliably.
Designing for Production
Mateus follows a philosophy he often shares with colleagues.
“We develop the product for production,” he said. “We don’t develop the production process for the product.”
In practice, that means prototypes must be designed with manufacturing in mind from the beginning. Component placement, label thickness, and materials must all align with the capabilities of the high-speed machines that will eventually produce the labels at scale.
“If you ignore manufacturing early in the design, you may end up with a prototype that cannot become a mass-producible product,” Mateus said.
That realization pushed him to expand his own expertise beyond circuit and antenna design. Over time, he began working closely with production teams to understand how converting and assembling machines process inlays to labels.
“To truly design for production, you need to understand how the machines work,” he said.
From Research to Real Products
At Identiv, years of research often converge into real-world breakthroughs.
One example came during a project with a company that needed a BLE-enabled label powered by an alternate rigid battery – something that initially seemed impractical for a thin, flexible tag.
But Mateus had previously explored RFID labels for constrained environments.
“Five years ago, most people would have said it wasn’t possible,” he said. “But I already had a method in mind that could make it work.”
By reconfiguring the antenna and circuit, Mateus was able to incorporate its surroundings into the overall system, improving signal performance.
The concept worked in theory – but it still had to be manufactured.
Working with production teams and equipment suppliers, Mateus adapted the design for Identiv’s converting machines. The idea moved from simulation to prototypes, then to machine-built samples, and ultimately into production runs of tens of thousands of labels.
“It’s very satisfying when research you did years ago suddenly becomes the solution to a real customer problem,” he said.
The Power of Engineering Curiosity
Much of Mateus’s research begins with simple curiosity.
He studies antenna innovations from other industries, explores new chip technologies from suppliers, and analyzes customer challenges brought in by sales teams. Sometimes those ideas remain theoretical for years. Other times, they quickly become new products.
In many cases, the groundwork is already done when a customer request arrives.
“Sometimes a sales engineer comes with a request and I can say immediately: I’ve already looked at something like this,” Mateus said. “That’s the advantage of doing the research first.”
At Identiv, that research-driven approach combines with a collaborative engineering culture that allows teams to move quickly from idea to prototype to production.
“If engineering, new product introduction, and operations are all aligned, we can move very fast,” Mateus said.
For engineers who thrive on experimentation and deep technical problem-solving, that environment can be uniquely rewarding.
“Be creative,” Mateus advised. “Don’t set limits. That’s how you build something better than the competition.”
