By Sharla Sikes

Every day it seems there’s a new one, with a catchy name and catchier promise of low calling rates.

Jaxtr isn’t brand new, but has been enjoying significant recent success, boosting its registered users from 500,000 to 5 million in just about half a year.

Jaxtr works by connecting landline and mobile phones over the internet. Callers are identified by e-mail addresses. It requires no software or softphone.

Registered Jaxtr customers receive a link they can send to friends and family, who can click on the link and enter their number. When the Jaxtr user picks up the phone, the caller’s phone rings and the call is connected. Jaxtr provides a local number for its members to dial when calling friends and family overseas.

Calling itself the fastest-growing internet communications service in history, Jaxtr claims to have beaten Skype, Hotmail and ICQ. Jaxtr hired Taneli Otala as vice president of engineering in order to manage its explosive growth. Otala has been in charge of technology at both MySQL, and Various, the owner of AdultFriendFinder.com.

“We looked for a long time to find somebody to help us with the growth challenges we currently have, and if anybody can do it, Taneli is the guy,” said Konstantin Guericke, CEO of Jaxtr and co-founder of LinkedIn.

Such growth isn’t unnoticed: Anna Lagerkvist at www.tech.co.uk raises the question: “Which web giant will get its wallet out first to snap up the Jaxtr phone/web link-up offering?”  YouTube, MySpace, Skype … When something becomes the Next Big Thing, it’s only a matter of time until a bigger corporation (i.e., Google) recognizes it as a moneymaker.

The other current question, though, is how it makes its money, without relying on advertising like some services do. But for its relatively short time on the market, its remarkable success guarantees it will have interested parties beating down the door fairly soon. Many VoIP providers offer a free or low-cost basic service, and higher-value services are expected to generate revenue—and lure customers to upgrade to the fee-based service.

Jaxtr is one of what Rebecca Swensen, a research analyst of VoIP services for IDC, calls a “new breed.”

“The new wave of VoIP services allow users to enjoy the benefits and simplicity of placing phone calls through their existing phones by selecting a name from the contact list and hitting the green ’send’ button. Jaxtr has demonstrated that ease-of-use is a critical factor to bringing VoIP into the mainstream. Mobile VoIP calls no longer require a PC or an Internet connection.”

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