Did the Netherlands Extend the Essential Start-up Personnel Permit?

What actually changed

The founder start-up residence permit is still a one-year product. See What happens after the Dutch Startup Visa year?. Nothing on the IND start-up page turns that year into a two-year founder permit.

What the IND now states is separate: a residence permit for essential start-up personnel exists as a pilot. The page currently says the pilot runs from 1 June 2021 to 1 June 2028.

If you saw older commentary that the scheme would stop in 2025 or 2026, check the live IND page rather than a blog post from last year.

This is not the founder permit

The start-up residence permit is for the person who starts the innovative company, with a facilitator and an RVO step-by-step plan. What a facilitator does is a different contract.

Essential start-up personnel is listed by the IND under work permits for an employee who is essential to that start-up. The IND fees table prices a first application or change of purpose, and an extension, at €423 in 2026.

We do not reprint extra conditions (equity, salary, or company age) that are not on the live IND page. Open that page and answer its situation questions before you offer someone a role.

How this sits next to ordinary hiring

A founder on a start-up permit can run a company that has staff. Each worker still needs their own right to work. Can a startup visa founder hire employees? is the overview.

EU, EEA, and Swiss staff generally do not need this permit. Non-EU hires do, unless they already hold a Dutch document that allows that work. Highly skilled migrant, EU Blue Card, and the single permit (GVVA) remain the usual employment routes. Those need an employer who is allowed to file that product.

Essential start-up personnel is an extra, time-limited option for a young innovative company. Treat it as optional and specific, not as a shortcut around recognised-sponsor rules.

What to do with this

• Do not tell a co-founder that “the visa was extended to 2028.” The founder year is still one year.
• If you need a named non-EU person in the core team, read the IND essential-personnel page first, then budget the €423 fee as one line, not the whole cost of hiring.
• Put hiring in the RVO plan only if you will actually do it. Headcount theatre does not make the product innovative.

IND decides the permit. RVO advises on the start-up route. NLVentureDesk is not a law firm.