About

ten Bruggencate Development was founded in March 2018 by Guy ten Bruggencate. The practice builds on more than 20 years of ICT experience: starting in 2002 in various roles at companies including Alphium, Reclamefolder (RTL Ventures), iedereenEHBO, Itonomy and Logius, and since 2018 as an independent senior developer and consultant.

Those years started on the side nobody sees: the security and the engine underneath the application, where things go wrong when they go wrong. That work later widened to the whole line — from the first conversation to software that runs. What stuck from those early years is a habit: first ask what can break, then build.

How the collaboration typically works

Most engagements run through a staffing partner — Brainbrothers, Gravitas, Vibe Group and Sanders & Creemers come up regularly. For you that changes little: you work with the same person, only the contract runs through them. Direct engagements are equally possible, and we pick the arrangement that fits per project.

We fit in with how your team already works — Scrum, Kanban, or simply a list of what needs doing. The emphasis is on short lines and a consistent point of contact: no handover moments where knowledge falls away, and no changing faces halfway through.

Expertise

We focus on:

• Web applications — Symfony, Laravel
• E-commerce platforms — Shopware, Pimcore, (legacy) Magento
• Learning & analytics environments — Moodle, Matomo
• Custom integrations — APIs, ERP connections, import/export modules
• Maintenance and upgrades — PHP version updates, framework migrations, refactoring
• Infrastructure & DevOps — Docker, CI/CD pipelines, Apache, Traefik

The technical toolkit is broad enough to handle a range of project types. Each engagement is matched to the stack that best fits the problem.

On the use of AI

We use Claude (Anthropic) as a fixed part of the work: reading code, looking things up, documentation, and large clean-ups in existing code. What does not go in: data from your production environment, passwords and keys, and personal details of your customers. When in doubt we ask first. The team page describes the collaboration between Guy and Claude in more detail.

Earlier experience before ten Bruggencate Development

The career starts in the summer of 2002, with four months on one of the first wireless internet cafés in the country — the holiday park had no connection of its own, so everything ran over a satellite dish. Before March 2018 Guy worked in employment and on placement; those years carry the experience the practice started with in 2018.

• Brainbrothers (2016–2018): senior PHP developer on placement. Three assignments fell within that period. At Logius (2017–2018), the backend of MijnOverheid.nl: connections and APIs to systems including DigiD and the Kadaster, plus an import and export system for the management and content module, with full unit-test coverage as a hard requirement. At a Symfony project office (Feb–Apr 2017), Magento work for SOA Aids Netherlands, Cult Company and Boots. And at Itonomy (2016–2017), a proof-of-concept for Sanoma's magazine.nl on Magento 2, whose technical setup later formed the basis for a new concept inside that company.
• Reclamefolder.nl (RTL Ventures) (2015–2016): senior backend developer on a new microservices architecture in PHP and Node.js, and builder of a realtime monitoring dashboard for app content.
• iedereenEHBO (RTL Ventures) (2014–2015): senior backend developer on e-learning platforms — connections for certification with Oranje Kruis and Rode Kruis, findability improvements, and project lead during the investigation of a new learning platform.
• Alphium (2006–2014): started on the support desk — first and second line, installations on client sites, training and manuals — and grew from there into a developer role. From 2008, designed and built the DIIS interview system from the ground up: two questionnaire modules, the statistical analysis underneath, white-label versions for clients, and configuration and training on site.

For the full list of roles and dates, see Guy ten Bruggencate's LinkedIn profile.