Exponential sums and rectangular partitions

Let F denote a finite field with q=p^f elements, and let σ(A) equal the trace of the square matrix A. This paper evaluates exponential sums of the form S(E,X₁,…,X_n)e{?σ(CX₁?X_nE)}, where S(E,X₁,…,X_n) denotes a summation over all matrices E,X₁,…,X_n of appropriate sizes over F, and C is a fixed matrix. This evaluation is then applied to the problem of counting ranked solutions to matrix equations of the form U₁?U_αA+DV₁?V_β=B where A,B,D are fixed matrices over F.