Thanks to my good friend Alec Saunders, I caught this news about Jaxtr. If not for some comments from Alec and Garrett Smith, the story would have probably slid below my radar. That's right, I don't read TechCrunch much, and would have missed it.

Alec said "I'm heartened that the Jaxtr team has raised money promising new paid for services, and that VC's are responding.  That's a sign of life beyond paying the mortgage, which is good for all of us in this industry. " And Garrett's comment was "Okay so this is really only mildly exciting. Money continues to flow towards VoIP services."

Critics, on the other hand, aren't quite as keen.

Here's the TechCrunch story

Jaxtr Closes $10 Million Series A; Announces 1 Million Users

Jaxtr has raised a $10 million Series A round led by August Capital with Mayfield Fund, Draper Richards, Draper Fisher Jurvetson and Luxemburg-based Mangrove Capital participating. They’ve also doubled their registered user base over last month, totalling 1 million users. They plan on getting to a break even point on the investment and to total 20 million users by the end of next year.
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I lean more to the critical side myself. I like the folks at Jaxtr and wish them great success. A good A round gives them some real impetus to move ahead. But from a financial perspective, I wonder how viable skimming minute costs is for a long term sustainable business. Were I a VC, would I put my money there? Probably not. Time will tell, and I hope they find a profitable niche in the market.

Technorati Tags: Jaxtr, unified communications