# Miyagami

> We place senior AI-native engineers, vetted by engineers who build with AI every day.

## What we are
Miyagami is a software engineering company founded in 2017, with offices in Amsterdam, London, Ho Chi Minh City and Da Nang, and 60+ people. It places senior AI-native engineers and AI engineers full-time inside client engineering teams. Engineers are employed by Miyagami and work from Ho Chi Minh City and Da Nang with full overlap in the CET afternoon; client relationships and account management are in Amsterdam. Miyagami has delivered 100+ products since 2017.

## Definitions
- AI-native engineer: An AI-native engineer is a full-stack developer with solid fundamentals in code quality, systems design and security, who directs coding agents on how to produce output and validates that output before it ships.
- AI engineer: builds AI itself: models, pipelines, retrieval, evaluation, the plumbing around a language model.
- Not a prompter: someone who uses an agent like a search box, one request at a time.

## What it costs
- A senior engineer costs €5,600 to €8,000 a month, full-time, with employment, payroll and compliance included.
- A senior local hire costs about €12,200 a month in Netherlands, about £7,700 a month in United Kingdom, about €11,600 a month in Germany, about kr127,700 a month in Sweden, about €12,500 a month in Belgium, about €11,100 a month in Ireland, about €12,200 a month in France, about kr91,400 a month in Denmark, about CHF17,800 a month in Switzerland, about $20,900 a month in United States, about C$15,000 a month in Canada (salary, employer costs and recruitment fee).
- No recruitment fee. No upfront cost.

## Terms
- Full-time only. Three-month minimum.
- Brief to shortlist: 5 working days. Shortlist to first commit: 3 weeks.
- Replacement at our cost, no charge for the handover period.
- A named account manager in Amsterdam.
- ISO 27001 certified. GDPR. EU data residency. IP transfers on payment. DBA-compliant contracting for Dutch engagements; no IR35 exposure for UK clients. Trust centre: https://trust.miyagami.com/

## How we vet (published)
Two assessments in a real codebase, sixty minutes each. The first runs without AI tools (fundamentals) and the second with the candidate's own AI coding tools.
- The fundamentals assessment: Communication; English level; Prioritisation; Debugging; Context-switch hygiene; Technical understanding
- The AI-native assessment: AI output verification; Tool orchestration; Spec-driven development; Prompt and context engineering; AI-accelerated debugging; Context-switch hygiene
Also assessed across both: judgement by risk, ownership, leverage. AI engineers are also assessed on evaluation design and on knowing when a model is the wrong tool.
Whitepaper: The Next 10X Engineer (Bo Wesdorp), https://www.miyagami.com/resources/whitepapers/the-next-10x-engineer
Whitepaper: From AI Mandate to AI Strategy (Dale Wesdorp), https://www.miyagami.com/resources/whitepapers/from-ai-mandate-to-ai-strategy

## Where we operate
Offices in Amsterdam (Keizersgracht 264, 1016 EV), London (Kings Cross, 29–31 Euston Rd, NW1 2SD), Ho Chi Minh City (177 Hai Bà Trưng, District 3) and Da Nang (178 Trần Hưng Đạo). Clients in the Netherlands, United Kingdom, Germany, Sweden and Belgium.

## Who we have worked with
Schiphol, Rabobank, Deloitte, Studeersnel (Studocu), Nrisk, SlimWonen, Hisense, Garmin, IHG, Marriott, TotalEnergies.

## What we don't do
- Part-time placements.
- Fixed-price builds shorter than twelve weeks.
- Anything requiring someone on site daily.
- Transformation programmes or strategy consulting.

## For founders
A twelve-week fixed-price build for €60,000: discovery €10,000 (two weeks, flat fee), design €10,000 (two weeks), delivery €40,000 (eight weeks). After launch, one full-stack engineer from €5,600 a month.

## Talent pool
- 3,000+ engineers assessed, 900+ senior, 1,000+ mid-level, 6+ years average experience.

## Engagement shapes
- Embedded in your team: engineers join your existing team and report to your lead. Best fit for enterprise and scale-ups.
- Dedicated team: a group of Miyagami engineers on a product or workstream you own. Best fit for SMEs and founders.

## Key pages
- How we vet (our assessment): https://www.miyagami.com/how-we-vet
- Pricing and calculator: https://www.miyagami.com/pricing
- Who we work with: https://www.miyagami.com/for-who (founders, SMEs, scale-ups and teams, enterprise)
- Senior developer salaries by country: https://www.miyagami.com/salaries
- Ways to add engineers, compared: https://www.miyagami.com/compare
- Offices: https://www.miyagami.com/locations
- Careers: https://www.miyagami.com/careers
- What an AI-native engineer is: https://www.miyagami.com/resources/whitepapers/the-next-10x-engineer
- Roles: https://www.miyagami.com/hire
- Knowledge base: https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles
- Contact: https://www.miyagami.com/contact

## Knowledge base
- [AI-native engineer vs AI engineer](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/ai-native-engineer-vs-ai-engineer): AI-native engineer and AI engineer are not the same role. This entry explains the difference, the overlap, and when you need which.
- [What is the difference between Firebase and Supabase?](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/difference-between-firebase-and-supabase): Firebase and Supabase both offer backend-as-a-service features, but differ in database model, pricing, and vendor lock-in. This entry explains how to choose between them.
- [What is the difference between React and Next.js?](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/difference-between-react-nextjs): React is a UI library and Next.js is a framework built on top of it. This entry compares them on routing, rendering and SEO, and explains when to use each.
- [What are the differences between the main SDLC models?](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/differences-between-main-sdlc-models): This entry compares Waterfall, Agile, Spiral, V-Model, Incremental, RAD, Lean and DevOps across structure, risk, delivery, cost and change management.
- [What is prompt engineering, and does it still matter](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/does-prompt-engineering-still-matter): Prompt engineering is the practice of crafting inputs to get better outputs from a language model. It still matters, but its scope has narrowed.
- [How long does it take to hire an offshore engineer](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/how-long-to-hire-an-offshore-engineer): Hiring timelines for offshore software engineers vary by model. Staff augmentation is fastest, typically 3–6 weeks.
- [How many engineers do you need now](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/how-many-engineers-do-you-need): AI tools raise output per engineer, but team size depends on scope, quality requirements and how well your team uses those tools.
- [How much production code is AI-generated](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/how-much-production-code-is-ai-generated): Estimates vary, but surveys suggest 20–40% of code in active codebases is now AI-assisted. What that figure actually means is complicated.
- [How do you assess an engineer's AI ability](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/how-to-assess-an-engineers-ai-ability): This entry covers practical signals and interview approaches for checking whether a developer uses AI tools in production work as well as in demos.
- [How to review AI-generated code](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/how-to-review-ai-generated-code): Reviewing AI-generated code changes some of what reviewers look for and keeps the rest. This entry covers both, plus the specific failure modes to check for.
- [What is human-in-the-loop, in engineering terms](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/human-in-the-loop-engineering): Human-in-the-loop in engineering means a system pauses and routes a decision to a person before proceeding. This entry covers how it works in practice.
- [The impact of AI on mobile app development](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/impact-of-ai-on-mobile-app-development): AI changes what mobile teams ship and how they build it. This entry covers personalisation, security, coding agents and automated testing.
- [Offshore development and the Dutch DBA law](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/offshore-development-dutch-dba-law): How the Dutch DBA law applies to offshore software developers, what schijnzelfstandigheid means in practice, and how to structure compliant engagements.
- [The pros and cons of different forms of web hosting](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/pros-and-cons-of-different-web-hosting-forms): Shared, VPS, dedicated, cloud, managed and colocation hosting each suit different needs. This entry compares the pros and cons of each type.
- [Pros and cons of React Native for mobile development](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/pros-and-cons-of-react-native-for-mobile-development): React Native lets you ship one codebase to iOS and Android, with trade-offs. This entry covers performance, cross-platform support, debugging and native API access.
- [What does a senior engineer cost in Vietnam](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/senior-engineer-cost-vietnam): This entry covers market salary ranges for senior engineers in Vietnam, what you actually pay through a partner, and how that compares to hiring in the Netherlands.
- [How do you test software you didn't design](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/testing-software-you-didnt-design): Standard coverage metrics mislead when you test software you didn't design. This entry explains what engineers should do instead when reviewing AI-generated code.
- [Why take-homes and algorithm interviews stopped working](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/the-take-home-is-dead-and-leetcode-never-measured-this): Why take-home assignments and algorithm interviews stopped filtering engineers, and the two working sessions that replaced them at Miyagami.
- [What changed about code review](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-changed-about-code-review): AI-generated code has changed what code review looks for. This entry explains why reviews take longer and what skills reviewers now need.
- [What is the difference between UI and UX design?](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-difference-ux-ui-design): UX design shapes how a product works and feels to use; UI design shapes how it looks and responds. Both matter, but they solve different problems.
- [What is a 10x engineer, now](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-a-10x-engineer): The 10x engineer idea predates AI tooling. This entry explains what the term means now, why it has changed, and how to tell when an engineer's AI use actually multiplies their output.
- [What is a coding agent](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-a-coding-agent): A coding agent is an AI system that writes, edits, runs and debugs code autonomously across multiple steps, without a human directing each action.
- [What is a model context window, in practice](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-a-context-window): A context window is the total text a model can process in one go. This entry explains what that means for engineers building real systems.
- [What is a software agency?](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-a-software-agency): A software agency builds custom applications and digital products for client businesses. This entry covers what agencies do, how they work and what to look for.
- [What is a vector database](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-a-vector-database): A vector database stores data as high-dimensional numerical vectors and retrieves it by similarity rather than exact match. It's used in AI search and RAG.
- [What is agentic coding](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-agentic-coding): Agentic coding is when an AI agent writes, runs, and revises code autonomously across multiple steps, with minimal human input per cycle.
- [What is an AI gateway](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-an-ai-gateway): An AI gateway is a proxy layer that sits between your application and one or more model APIs, handling routing, auth, rate limits, logging and cost controls.
- [What is an AI-native engineer](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-an-ai-native-engineer): An AI-native engineer builds production software with AI tools as a core part of how they work every day. This entry covers what that looks like in practice.
- [What is an eval](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-an-eval): An eval is a test that measures how well a language model or AI system performs on a defined task. Teams use evals to check whether a change makes the system better or worse.
- [What is an MCP server](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-an-mcp-server): An MCP server exposes tools, data and prompts to AI models via a standard protocol. This entry explains what it is and why it matters.
- [What is an application?](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-application): An application is software built to help users accomplish specific tasks. This entry covers web, mobile, desktop and enterprise types and how they differ.
- [What is Backend as a Service (BaaS)?](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-backend-as-a-service): BaaS provides pre-built cloud infrastructure (databases, auth, storage, APIs) so teams ship apps without building or managing servers from scratch.
- [What is context engineering](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-context-engineering): Context engineering is the practice of designing what information a model receives, when, and in what structure. This entry covers how engineers apply it in real systems.
- [What is Firebase?](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-firebase): Firebase is Google's all-in-one backend platform for web and mobile apps, bundling databases, auth, storage, hosting, and analytics in one console.
- [What is a mobile app?](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-mobile-app): A mobile app is software installed directly on a smartphone or tablet, distinct from browser-based web apps. This entry covers how they're built, distributed and categorised.
- [What is prompt injection](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-prompt-injection): Prompt injection is an attack where malicious input manipulates an AI model's instructions, causing it to behave in unintended or harmful ways.
- [What is RAG](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-rag): RAG connects a language model to an external knowledge source at inference time, so answers draw on retrieved documents rather than training data alone.
- [What is Supabase?](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-supabase): Supabase is an open-source backend-as-a-service built on PostgreSQL, offering auth, storage, APIs, and real-time data without vendor lock-in.
- [What is vibe coding](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-vibe-coding): Vibe coding means generating software by describing intent in natural language and accepting the output with little or no manual review. This entry covers what that looks like in practice.
- [What is a web app?](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-is-web-app): A web app is interactive software that runs in a browser. This entry explains how web apps work, what types exist and how they differ from static websites.
- [What replaced the coding test](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-replaced-the-coding-test): The traditional coding test is losing ground to task-based reviews and structured AI-tool sessions that better reflect how engineers actually work.
- [What we score with AI tools off](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-we-score-before-the-agent-is-allowed-in): Inside Miyagami's fundamentals assessment: sixty minutes in an unseen codebase with no AI, six scored criteria, and why fundamentals license everything else.
- [What we score with the candidate's agents on](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/what-we-score-when-the-candidate-has-an-agent-open): The six criteria Miyagami publishes for assessing AI-native engineers, from output verification to context-switch hygiene, and why the standard is public.
- [When to opt for Webflow vs. custom code development](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/when-to-opt-for-webflow-vs-custom-code-development): Webflow suits fast, content-driven sites with non-technical teams. Custom code is right for complex features, scalability, security, and SEO control.
- [Writing code stopped being the hard part](https://www.miyagami.com/resources/articles/writing-code-stopped-being-the-hard-part): Why the 10X engineer is observable again, what an AI-native engineer actually is, and why CVs, take-homes and tooling conversations can't tell them apart.