Product apéro ⚡️ From startup to unicorn: inside Aikido's product story
Aikido Security hit a $1B valuation in January 2026, three years after founding in Ghent.
We've invited Maarten De Schuymer, Head of Product at Aikido, to walk us through what product management looks like when you're scaling fast enough to hit unicorn status in under three years.
He'll share how they've scaled Aikido, which decisions mattered, how they stay close to customers while shipping at speed, and what the AI era demands from PMs who want to stay relevant.
The rules of building have shifted, and the PMs who are thriving right now aren't the ones who adopted AI the fastest: they're the ones who understood what really changed.
🎙️ Our speaker
Maarten De Schuymer is Head of Product at Aikido Security, a Belgian cybersecurity platform used by 100,000+ teams worldwide, including Revolut, SoundCloud, and the Premier League. Founded in Ghent in 2022, Aikido reached a $1B valuation in January 2026, making it one of the fastest cybersecurity companies in Europe to ever get there.
His approach to the job: good at saying no, ruthless prioritisation, everything else is secondary.
Before product, he studied cognitive neuropsychology at Ghent University, and has since concluded that understanding how people think is, in fact, the job.
🗓️ Agenda
18:00: Check-in & networking
19:00: Keynote
19:30: Discussion + Q&A From
20:00: Networking, free pizza & beers 🍕🍺
You’ll walk away with
A ground-level view of how product decisions get made at a company scaling faster than most playbooks account for,
A clearer sense of what "staying close to the customer" actually means when your user base triples in a year,
Maarten's honest take on what the AI era demands from PMs, and why the answer is less obvious than most people assume.
📍Avenue Louise, 350 - Ixelles, Belgium (8th floor)
🎟️ Spots are limited! Reserve your seat now.