The Maiorana Method to Generate Multiple-Valued Bent Functions Revisited

A matrix-based formal representation of the Maiorana Method to generate MV-bent functions is introduced and a proof of correctness is given. The generation of bent, and strict bent multiple-valued functions is analyzed. It is shown that all bent functions generated with the Maiorana method are strict bent. Finally it is shown that the number of ternary bent functions of 4 arguments is at least 708,588. A general lower bound on the number of multiple-valued bent functions on an even and odd number of arguments is provided.