AI Startup CEO Reveals What Really Kills AI Projects
Beyond Coding1 Loka 2025

AI Startup CEO Reveals What Really Kills AI Projects

What if the biggest obstacles to AI innovation aren't what you think? Deeploy CEO Maarten Stolk shares his controversial but effective strategies for building successful AI products and ecosystems, challenging the common wisdom around bottom-up initiatives and regulation.


In this episode, we cover:


Why bottom-up initiatives fail without strong top-down vision.

The surprising benefits of the EU's AI Act for innovation.

How to build a thriving AI ecosystem from the ground up.

The single most important metric for AI observability.

This conversation is for tech leaders, founders, and engineers who want to move beyond AI experiments and build real-world, production-ready systems.


Timestamps:

00:00:00 - Intro

00:00:45 - Why Maarten Started a Dutch AI Hub

00:02:15 - The "Flywheel" Effect Crucial for AI Success

00:04:42 - The Hard Truth: Why the Netherlands is Lagging in AI

00:07:52 - A Controversial Take: The EU AI Act is Actually Good for Everyone

00:11:26 - The Real Bottleneck to Innovation Isn't Regulation

00:14:25 - From POC to Production: Why Top-Down Vision is Non-Negotiable

00:17:13 - A Wake-Up Call for Inexperienced Leadership Teams

00:20:30 - How Winning Companies Use AI to Dominate Their Market

00:23:44 - The Right Way to Learn From Your Competitors

00:27:30 - Maarten Outsourced Core Development to an AI Company

00:31:59 - The #1 Metric You Must Track for AI Observability

00:36:03 - Open-Source vs. Closed-Source: Which AI Model Will Win?

00:40:23 - The Inevitable Crisis That Will Force Innovation

00:42:19 - The Power of Having a Long-Term Personal Vision


#AIStrategy #TechLeadership #Innovation


Jaksot(239)

Learning, Open Source Communities and Systems with William Rizzo

Learning, Open Source Communities and Systems with William Rizzo

Connect with William Rizzo:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/william-rizzo https://github.com/wrkode Full episode on YouTube ▶️ https://youtu.be/7-HKy1D7iso New episodes every Wednesday with our host ⁠⁠⁠...

28 Kesä 202344min

Programming languages, Work Cultures Abroad and finding Joy with Abdullah Zaiter

Programming languages, Work Cultures Abroad and finding Joy with Abdullah Zaiter

My friend and colleague Abdullah Zaiter joins us for this episode today 🙌  He shares thoughts on using different programming languages, shares his experience working in different organisations abroad...

21 Kesä 202349min

How to Change and Improve Organisations with Nilguin van Raad

How to Change and Improve Organisations with Nilguin van Raad

This episode with Nilguin van Raad is one of my favourites.  Be sure to check it out and let me know what you think 🎙 A few quotes that stuck with me: With pure intentions and zero judgement you c...

14 Kesä 202347min

Serverless, Microservices, Software Architecture and Food 😋 with Yan Cui

Serverless, Microservices, Software Architecture and Food 😋 with Yan Cui

I left in a bit more of the pre-show than usual, let me know if you enjoyed that part.  AWS Serverless hero (man that's a cool title 🤩), Yan Cui comes on to share his journey with Serverless and tak...

7 Kesä 202359min

Q&A #4: Passion, Day in the Life, YouTube and Patrick’s NYC trip & More with Patrick Akil

Q&A #4: Passion, Day in the Life, YouTube and Patrick’s NYC trip & More with Patrick Akil

The more I do these Q&A's, the more privileged it feels. I get to share my experience, introspect, reminisce, laugh and hopefully add value and perspective. Thank you for making it possible :) #Q&A n...

31 Touko 202341min

Hackathon Awesomeness, Career Benefits and Culture with Sashrika Kaur

Hackathon Awesomeness, Career Benefits and Culture with Sashrika Kaur

I’ve never heard someone talk bad about hackathons. Everyone loves it. The projects that’ve been built during hackathons have even been the start of a company, of something big. But what about hackath...

24 Touko 202357min

Blogging, Teaching and Sharing Knowledge with Andrew Duthie

Blogging, Teaching and Sharing Knowledge with Andrew Duthie

Andrew comes on to share his love for blogging and knowledge sharing in general. Especially with regards to teaching. Whether it’s in tech, or anywhere else, it’s incredibly rewarding and fulfilling t...

17 Touko 202357min

How to Build a Product Company with Andreas Prins

How to Build a Product Company with Andreas Prins

Andreas Prins comes on to share the pivot and journey he’s gone through with StackState, a product company. My biggest takeaway is how much more effective you can be by solving one problem, and solvin...

10 Touko 202347min