SafePay

The programmable escrow infrastructure for AI agents and cross-border commerce.

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Inspiration

International trade is becoming more accessible than ever, but trust remains one of the biggest barriers. Buyers worry about paying before receiving goods or services, while sellers fear delivering without guaranteed payment. Existing escrow platforms solve part of this problem but often have high fees, limited payment options, and friction caused by fragmented financial systems.

SafePay was inspired by the idea that anyone, anywhere in the world, should be able to trade confidently using their preferred payment method. Our goal is to combine traditional finance and blockchain into a single intelligent escrow infrastructure that makes secure commerce simple.

What it does

SafePay is a programmable escrow platform for global commerce.

Users can create agreements, fund transactions using fiat or cryptocurrency, and release payments when agreed conditions are met. The platform supports milestone payments, built-in dispute resolution, intelligent payment routing, currency conversion, and a unified API for businesses.

Instead of forcing users into one payment rail, SafePay intelligently connects multiple providers behind a single interface, making cross-border transactions faster, safer, and easier.

How we built it

SafePay is being built using a modern, scalable architecture designed for financial infrastructure.

Our stack includes:

  • TypeScript
  • Node.js
  • PostgreSQL
  • Redis
  • Docker
  • REST APIs
  • Hexagonal Architecture
  • Domain-Driven Design (DDD)

The platform is organized into independent services for agreements, payments, custody, settlements, disputes, treasury management, and risk monitoring. Every financial action is recorded through immutable audit trails, making the system secure, transparent, and ready for future regulatory compliance.

Challenges we ran into

Building financial infrastructure introduces challenges far beyond traditional software development.

Some of the biggest challenges included:

  • Designing an escrow engine that supports both fiat and cryptocurrency.
  • Creating a flexible payment architecture capable of supporting multiple providers.
  • Handling currency conversion while maintaining agreement integrity.
  • Building a dispute workflow that remains fair to both buyers and sellers.
  • Designing for future compliance requirements without sacrificing user experience.
  • Keeping the architecture modular enough to support future integrations and global expansion.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We're proud of designing a strong foundation for a next-generation escrow platform.

Highlights include:

  • A flexible agreement engine with milestone support.
  • Intelligent payment routing architecture.
  • Unified API-first platform design.
  • Support for both traditional finance and blockchain payments.
  • A scalable Domain-Driven Design architecture.
  • Comprehensive audit trail and risk management foundations.
  • A clear roadmap toward global payment interoperability.

What we learned

This project reinforced that trust is the hardest problem in digital commerce.

We learned that building payment infrastructure requires balancing security, usability, scalability, and compliance from the very beginning. We also learned the importance of designing extensible systems where new payment providers, currencies, and settlement methods can be added without rewriting the platform.

What's next for SafePay

Our next milestones include:

  • Completing the core escrow engine.
  • Integrating payment providers for fiat and crypto transactions.
  • Launching developer APIs and SDKs.
  • Adding milestone-based contracts and advanced dispute resolution.
  • Expanding intelligent routing across multiple global payment providers.
  • Launching a public beta for businesses and developers.
  • Building the infrastructure that enables trusted cross-border commerce at global scale.
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