On 30 September 2026, ElevenLabs opened an office in Brussels and said it plans to triple its Belgian team this year. The British voice AI company already works with Mediafin, Cavell, Corilus and Glowi to turn text into audio or automate customer conversations. For a company operating in Belgium, the move confirms that voice assistants and conversational agents are moving past the testing stage.
1. What ElevenLabs' arrival in Brussels changes
On 30 September 2026, ElevenLabs announced the opening of an office in Brussels' European quarter. The company, valued at 11 billion dollars according to TheNextWeb, plans to triple its Belgian team this year. Falke Van Onacker now leads the local operations.
The choice of location is not neutral. Belgium has three official languages, and more than 100 languages are spoken daily in Brussels, a context covered by ElevenLabs' models in over 90 languages.
2. Belgian companies already use these tools
Several Belgian firms had integrated the technology even before the Brussels office opened. Mediafin, publisher of De Tijd and L'Echo, converts up to 10 million characters of text into audio every month, in Dutch and French. Cavell is preparing to roll out a voice assistant to 8,000 doctors, while Corilus and Glowi use the technology for business software and multilingual recruitment screening.
About twenty Belgian organisations also receive grants from the company for projects linked to education, the arts or accessibility, according to ElevenLabs' announcement.
3. What this means for Belgian SMEs
A player of this size setting up physically confirms a trend. Voice assistants and conversational agents are moving past the test stage and into the daily operations of companies, large and small. A service available around the clock, in several languages, becomes a concrete argument when facing a multilingual customer base.
But a local presence does not settle everything. Before adopting this kind of tool, a company needs to check where its data is hosted, how voices are used, and who oversees the actual quality of the responses given to customers.
4. The limits to keep in mind
Language breadth does not guarantee the accuracy of a brand's tone, nor GDPR compliance of the hosting chosen. A poorly calibrated voice assistant can also confuse a customer rather than reassure them, especially on sensitive topics like health or finance.
The AI lens, humans first
Voice AI can generate a message, answer a simple question or transcribe an exchange within seconds, in the customer's own language. It does not, however, decide on the tone to use with an unhappy customer, nor where the line sits between useful automation and a dehumanised service. A Belgian company considering this kind of tool keeps control of the script, the quality checks and the cases that must be handed over to a human. AI executes. Expertise decides, and keeps watch.
This week
This week, listen to an audio sample generated by a tool like this one in your working languages to judge its real quality before any commitment. List the three questions your customers ask most often by phone or chat to see whether an assistant could handle them without losing quality. Finally, check in any contract with a voice AI provider where the data is hosted and who remains liable in case of error.
Vistalaro Build designs and oversees the agents and assistants that automate part of customer service, with GDPR-compliant hosting and a clear handover to a human. Vistalaro Pilot helps a company decide where voice automation makes sense in its customer journey, and where human expertise must stay on the front line.
Could your company already automate part of its phone reception or chat?
The technology exists, but quality and compliance need checking before you commit.
Let's talk- ElevenLabs (communiqué officiel), ElevenLabs se lance en Belgique et ouvre un bureau à Bruxelles (30 September 2026, in French)
- BX1, Le géant de l'IA vocale ElevenLabs s'installe à Bruxelles (30 September 2026, in French)
- TheNextWeb, ElevenLabs opens Brussels office and plans to triple its Belgian team (30 September 2026)