Although the full details of the Clinkle payments platform are yet be revealed, its 22-year-old founder and Stanford graduate Lucas Duplan has promised something “fundamentally different from everything else out there.”

“There are close to one million apps in the Apple App Store,” he said in a blog post announcing the investment round, “yet, none let you comfortably go a week or even a couple of days without paper bills or plastic cards. The exchange of value is one of humanity’s most important inventions. But somehow, the way in which we transact hasn’t significantly changed in decades… So we’ve decided to do something about it.”

The launch of an app is being touted for this year starting with university students in the US, so September or October look to be likely targets. More than 25,000 people have already entered their contact details for an opportunity to be among the platforms first users.

Duplan has said that the software is focused on creating enough of an incentive for both consumers and merchants to swap cash and cards for mobile – not a particularly incovenient existing system. Peer-to-peer payments are also on the cards.

The range of backers has stirred considerable interest so expect to see more on this in the coming months. Perhaps we will all be clinkling as often as we Google by this time next year. Interestingly, the list of investors includes mobile payments provider Intuit, as well as Andrew Viterbi, co-founder of Qualcomm, Dick Fredericks, a former US ambassador to Switzerland, a former CEO of Symantec, Gordon Eubanks, plus PayPals Peter Thiel and Owen Van Natta, former COO, Facebook. Among many others.