Handshake Finance raises US$366.7K pre-seed for escrow-as-a-service
What's the deal? Handshake Finance, a Singapore-based fintech startup, has closed a US$366.7K pre-seed funding round to build escrow-as-a-service infrastructure for high-trust service industries. The company holds customer funds in escrow and releases them to service providers against agreed milestones — protecting both sides of a transaction.
Founded in September 2025 by Christopher Chan and Lee Jun Xian, the startup is starting with Singapore's renovation and interior design market before expanding to other service sectors like event planning, creative agencies, and professional services.
Why now? The renovation industry in Singapore has no mandatory licensing or regulatory framework. Anyone can set up as an interior designer with no accreditation required. Homeowners routinely pay up to 50% of a project's value upfront, with funds going directly to designers before work begins.
When firms collapse mid-project, there's little recourse. The founders were motivated by personal experience: one co-founder's close friend lost US$58.7K in pre-payments to a renovation company that went under. The other's friend paid a deposit on a fraudulent rental listing.
Handshake operates on bank-grade payment infrastructure provided by MAS-regulated partners, with funds held in segregated escrow accounts at DBSDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →. "We are trying to solve a structural trust gap in service industries. But before any of that, our users have to trust us," said Chan.
What could go wrong? Escrow services depend on both parties — customers and service providers — willingly adopting a new payment layer that adds friction and cost. Renovation firms accustomed to receiving large upfront deposits may resist a model that ties payments to milestones.
The startup also faces the challenge of expanding beyond its beachhead market. Each service industry has different payment norms and trust dynamics, which could make scaling the platform complex and slow.
The signal: Handshake Finance is entering a niche that sits at the intersection of two broader fintech movements: embedded finance and trust infrastructure for underserved verticals. Its escrow-as-a-service model targets industries where regulatory gaps leave consumers exposed — a pattern visible across Southeast Asia's fragmented service economies. Whether the startup can convert that structural problem into a scalable platform will depend on achieving adoption from service providers who currently benefit from the status quo of large upfront deposits.
Read more: Channel News Asia
