The geometry of rank decompositions of matrix multiplication II: $3\times 3$ matrices

Abstract: This is the second in a series of papers on rank decompositions of the matrix multiplication tensor. We present new rank $23$ decompositions for the $3\times 3$ matrix multiplication tensor $M_{\langle 3\rangle}$. All our decompositions have symmetry groups that include the standard cyclic permutation of factors but otherwise exhibit a range of behavior. One of them has 11 cubes as summands and admits an unexpected symmetry group of order 12. We establish basic information regarding symmetry groups of decompositions and outline two approaches for finding new rank decompositions of $M_{\langle n\rangle}$ for larger $n$.