01 · FounderAmsterdamEngineering
About Arcken
Why we built Arcken.
A Netherlands-based AI-native build studio. Two founders, one colleague in Amsterdam, and a Board of Advisors who operate the same markets we sell into. We ship builds, not hours and not seats, and we say why below, in our own words.
From the founders
Why we built Arcken, in our own words.
The only page on the site in the founder voice. Everywhere else, Arcken speaks as a team.
We started Arcken because the category we belonged in didn’t exist.
Agencies sell hours, and the moment the retainer ends, so does the work. SaaS companies sell seats on a product built for the median customer, not yours. Neither of those matches how AI-native software actually gets built in 2026: closer to a live deployment than a licensed product, more configured than generic, funded by what it does rather than by how many chairs sit in front of it.
A studio that ships builds, runs them like infrastructure, and turns them into products only when the customers are there to justify it, is what we set out to be. Our first build runs today for a Dutch mobile telecoms operator’s renewal flow, in Dutch, on WhatsApp, inside the commercial guardrails their team set. Four weeks from SOW to live. A per-event fee keeps it maintained. When it earns enough customers to become a full product, it will. Until then, the shape is the shape.
Arcken is small on purpose. With three advisors who built businesses in exactly the markets we sell into.
Martijn Jaartsveld & Tije Friederichs
Amsterdam · 2026
- 2025
- Founded in Amsterdam
- 4working
- The team in Amsterdam today
- 7live
- Launch customers in production
- 3live
- Products in production
The working team
Three people, one engagement at a time.
Smallness is a feature. We’d rather do ten engagements properly than lose context on a hundred. If you hire us, the two or three people signing the SOW are the two or three people on your pilot call.
01 · Founder02 · FounderAmsterdamCommercial
03 · FounderAmsterdamCreative
Board of Advisors
Three operators who built in the markets we sell into.
A small studio with a Board of Advisors reads as institutional for a reason. They advise us weekly, they are named, and each one sharpens a different edge of the company.
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Sharpens us on the commercial side: pipeline shape, pricing conversations, the kind of customer to say no to.
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Sharpens us on the product side: what to build, what to refuse to build, and which decisions look obvious only in hindsight.
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Sharpens us on the regulatory and compliance side: AI Act, DPAs, how to write a security review a lawyer will sign.
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Now the sales call
Book thirty minutes. Yes or no in the same call.
The quickest way to know whether Arcken is the studio for your problem is the first call. Tell us the problem in one paragraph; we’ll tell you on the call whether we can ship in four weeks, eight, or not at all.