Patrick van der Mijl

Co-Founder & Chief Product Officer Speakap

Last Reviewed: September 19, 2026

Executive Summary

Patrick van der Mijl is a co-founder and the Chief Product Officer of Speakap, an employee communication platform built specifically for frontline and deskless workers. He and co-founder Erwin van der Vlist arrived at the idea from inside the problem: both were managing a Dutch supermarket while at university, and both could see that the staff actually facing customers were the last people in the organization to learn anything. Corporate communication tools assumed a desk, a computer, and a company email address, none of which a shop-floor worker has. Speakap was built on the opposite assumption, and is now used by global brands including IKEA, Rituals, and McDonald’s.

Career Highlights

• Co-founded Speakap in Amsterdam in 2011 with Erwin van der Vlist, and serves as Chief Product Officer.
• Grew the platform into international use by brands including IKEA, Rituals, and McDonald’s.
• Built the product mobile-first from the outset, for a workforce without desks or corporate email.
• Identified the problem directly while working as a supermarket manager in the Dutch retail sector.
• Holds a BBA in Management, Economics and Law with a Real Estate Management specialization.

Professional Journey

Van der Mijl studied business administration in the Netherlands, taking a BBA covering management, economics and law with a specialization in real estate management, and worked as a real estate agent and broker. Alongside university he worked in the retail sector, managing a Dutch supermarket — the job that turned out to matter most.

Working the shop floor with his future co-founder Erwin van der Vlist, he observed something that is obvious from the inside and invisible from head office: internal communication in retail barely functions. Decisions, promotions, policy changes and schedules were distributed through noticeboards, printed memos, and word of mouth, and the employees dealing with customers directly were routinely the last to hear. The corporate intranets and email systems that solved this for office workers were useless to staff who had neither a desk nor an account.

By 2009 the two had identified smartphones as the change that made a solution feasible. Mobile internet meant every employee was already carrying a device capable of receiving company information, if only something existed to deliver it. They began building a platform and introducing it into retail organizations, and founded Speakap in Amsterdam in 2011.

The product’s defining constraint is who it is for. Frontline and deskless workers make up a large share of the global workforce and have historically been served last by enterprise software, because they are not the buyers and not the users the category was designed around. Speakap treats them as the primary user, putting internal communication, scheduling information, and organizational updates on a phone in a form that works in the few minutes someone has between shifts.

The company grew into international deployment with global brands including IKEA, Rituals, and McDonald’s. Van der Mijl leads product as Chief Product Officer.

Education

University of Applied Sciences, Netherlands

BBA, Management, Economics and Law, Real Estate Management