xG technology announced today that its first commercial product based on its low-power xMax wireless technology will be a wireless VoIP phone available in 2006. 

“A single base station will handle 30,000 subscribers using 300 minutes per month, based on current cellular-usage models,” said Chris Whiteley, vice president of business development at xG Technology. “But we expect to drive a change in usage patterns. Even at 3,600 minutes per month, the system will support 2,500 users.”

xG Technology claims a base station will not cost the company excess amounts. Whitney assessed that “a number of companies have expressed interest, but nobody’s signed up yet.” While it is not announced which company will be building the phone, xG reportedly signed with a major handset maker for the production of the phone. “We’ve signed with an expert, known producer of VoIP handsets,” said Whiteley. “They’re bringing a lot of hardware and software expertise, and we’re adding our xMax chip.” The name of the company in partnership will be announced in August. 

xG claims that its relatively new chip-based wireless technology will be ”the lowest cost method yet developed for deploying competitive wireless services,” and that its system will be “1,000 times more efficient than WiMAX.”   However, xMax’s advancement over WiMAX and WiFi platforms is its power efficiency. xMax, known for operating at extremely low power levels, will cost 25 times less than a traditional wireless phone system.  

According to the company, with its new technology “small companies, institutions and communities can deploy wireless VoIP networks for thousands rather than millions of dollars.”