OpenIris
Bridging the Gap Between Citizens and Government
AI-powered citizen participation for the 21st century. Pre-Seed Investment Round.
Pre-Seed Round
GovTech · AI · Civic Engagement
Citizen Participation in the Netherlands Is Broken
Municipalities are legally required to involve citizens — but the tools they rely on are failing everyone.
🏛️ Empty Town Halls
Municipal meetings attract the same 10 people every time, never a true cross-section of the community.
📋 Surveys Nobody Fills
Traditional surveys get <5% response rates and systematically miss marginalized communities.
🌍 Language Barriers
40% of Dutch residents in major cities speak a language other than Dutch at home, yet tools are Dutch-only.
⚖️ Legal Obligation
The Omgevingswet (Jan 2024) mandates citizen involvement, but municipalities lack effective tools to comply.

The result: Policies are made without real citizen input → distrust, protests, and poor outcomes. Existing platforms (Civocracy, OpenStad, Gemeentepeiler) still rely on forms and text — excluding the elderly, digitally less literate, and non-Dutch speakers.
Meet Iris: Your Digital Assitant
OpenIris replaces outdated surveys and empty town halls with AI-driven conversations at scale. Iris reaches every resident — in their language, on their device, at their convenience.
Speaks 40+ Languages
Iris calls or chats with every resident in their own language, automatically, with no extra staff required.
Natural Voice Conversations
No long forms. No confusing interfaces. Just a natural phone or chat conversation, like talking to a knowledgeable neighbor.
Thousands Simultaneously
Iris handles thousands of simultaneous conversations without adding a single staff member to the payroll.
Privacy-by-Design
Anonymous participation lowers the barrier for honest feedback. Citizens speak freely when they know they're protected.
The Product — Three Pillars
OpenIris is a complete citizen engagement platform built on three complementary pillars that work together to create genuine democratic dialogue.
Digital Assistant | Frontline Phone Support
Your municipality's 24/7 AI receptionist. Answers questions about permits, civil affairs, and the social domain. Routes citizens to the right department instantly. No more "kastje naar de muur."
Currently live in Doesburg: +31 97006521426
Idea Box | Community Voice Platform
A platform where residents share ideas and reports about their neighborhood. Automatic moderation of hate speech. Like and comment to surface the best ideas. Transform ideas directly into policy conversations.
Policy Feedback Campaigns
Present policy proposals to citizens. Collect feedback at scale via natural conversations. Respond to all participants with one click. Build lasting dialogue with the community over time.
How It Works | Four Simple Steps
From setup to data-backed decisions, OpenIris makes citizen participation effortless for municipalities and residents alike.
The entire cycle — from project setup to actionable insights — can be completed in days, not months. Municipalities get real community input without the overhead of traditional participation processes.
Traction — Growing Fast
We're gaining serious momentum across Dutch municipalities, with 750K+ inhabitants represented in our active pipeline.
Live Now
Gemeente Doesburg
Pilot running — internal testing phase active. Our first live deployment proving the technology works in a real municipal environment.
Testing
Gemeente Venlo — 100K inhabitants
Actively testing the product with key stakeholders.
Gemeente Almere — 230K inhabitants
Influential stakeholder testing underway.
In Pipeline
Gemeente Arnhem — 200K inhabitants
Meeting scheduled March 5th.
Gemeente Nijmegen — 180K inhabitants
Interested — meeting being planned.
Gemeente Peel en Maas — 40K inhabitants
Wants to talk after municipal elections.

🎤 May 6th: Presenting at congress co-organized with Gemeente Groningen.
Market Opportunity | A Massive, Mandated Market
🇳🇱 The Netherlands
Dutch Market
342 municipalities — all legally required to do citizen participation under the Omgevingswet.
342
Municipalities
All legally mandated to participate
€35M
Dutch TAM ARR
342 municipalities × €54K–€102K/year
€5.1M
Serviceable ARR
First 3 years: 50 municipalities
🌍 Europe
European Market
90,000+ municipalities across the EU face the same problems: low turnout, language barriers, lack of tools.
€5B+
European TAM for GovTech citizen engagement
90,000+
EU municipalities with participation mandates

Why now? Omgevingswet went live January 2024. AI (LLMs) finally makes multilingual voice conversations affordable. Post-COVID digital adoption in government has accelerated dramatically. Even the EU is looking for opportunities to be more transparent in decision making. This would allow them to also do research and increase transparency crossing borders.
Business Model — Land and Expand
Municipalities start with the low-commitment Digital Assistant, then upgrade to the full platform once they see results. High switching costs once integrated create durable revenue.
Option 1 — Land
Digital Assistant
Option 2 — Expand
Complete Platform
Extra Assistant
+€1,000/month per additional AI assistant line
Extra Conversations
+€500/month per additional 1,000 conversations
High Switching Costs
Once integrated into municipal workflows, retention is extremely high
Competitive Advantage — We're in a Category of One
OpenIris is the only platform using AI voice conversations to reach citizens who would never fill out a form — the elderly, non-Dutch speakers, and the digitally less literate.

Key differentiator: Every competitor relies on forms and text. OpenIris is the only solution that reaches citizens through natural voice conversations making participation accessible to everyone, not just the digitally confident.
The Team ||||| TOOODOOO
A small, driven team of 2–4 people building at the intersection of AI, government, and citizen engagement. We have deep understanding of Dutch municipal processes and citizen participation challenges — and we're personally pitching to municipalities and running pilots ourselves.
AI & Technology Expertise
Deep hands-on experience building and deploying large language model applications in production environments at scale.
Government Domain Knowledge
Intimate understanding of Dutch municipal processes, procurement cycles, and the political dynamics of citizen participation.
Founder-Led Sales
Founders personally pitching to municipalities, running pilots, and building relationships — no outsourced sales layer between us and our customers.

Team details to be added. We are actively building the founding team and will share full bios in follow-up materials.
Our Vision | Every Voice Counts
Every resident in Europe has a voice in the decisions that affect their lives, regardless of language, digital skills, or availability.
Start in the Netherlands
Win Dutch municipalities. Prove the model. Build the reference base.
Scale Across Europe
90,000+ municipalities. Same problems. Same solution. €5B+ market.
Become the Standard
The default platform for AI-powered citizen participation worldwide.
📧 Contact Us
Ready to join the journey? Reach out to learn more about the pre-seed round and how OpenIris is reshaping democratic participation.
🌐 Try Iris Live
Call our live pilot in Doesburg: +31 97006521426 experience the future of citizen engagement firsthand.
📅 Next Steps
We're scheduling investor conversations now. Let's discuss how OpenIris fits your portfolio and timeline.