Space & Satellite Futures: Could An Antenna Change the World? The Cohort Asks Ryan Stevenson.

Ryan Stevenson is the Chief Scientist and a founding member of Kymeta, where he led one of the most consequential breakthroughs in satellite antenna technology: the world's first simultaneous connection to both Ku and Ka frequency bands in a single, compact metamaterial surface. It is the kind of achievement that looks inevitable in hindsight and was anything but in practice. In this episode of Orbited, the 2025 20 Under 35 cohort asks Ryan how he knew when to ship, what assumption he had to stop accepting before the solution became visible, and where metamaterial antennas are headed as spectrum congestion becomes an industry-wide problem. He also makes the case for why orbital debris cleanup may be the most important technology to watch, and shares what he'd tell high schoolers about entering a space industry in the middle of a massive disruption cycle.