Ask HN: Do you trust SaaS software made by China teams? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Do you trust SaaS software made by China teams?

#11

Post by comprev » Mon, Jan 22, 2024, 2:18 PM UTC

shawnpang wrote: post #10

comprev wrote: post #5

The laws within the country by which the product operates - and stores data - might not be compatible with regulations in which the customer must operate. The legal headache for a US/EU company to use a SaaS product from China would not be worth the cost and risk. It's not about the company or teams trying to prove trustworthy.

This is the most objective answer! If a Chinese SaaS company wants to grow in US/EU, compliance is a place they must invest in.

Cynically most people will probably assume (with zero evidence, just hearsay) their data is mirrored outside of the EU/US as companies bow to pressure from CCP.

Something along the lines of “We will grant you a license to operate in EU/US on the grounds we have full authority to inspect all customer data to ensure you are complying with CCP regulations”

Either way it’s a tough uphill battle for Chinese companies!

Re: Ask HN: Do you trust SaaS software made by China teams?

#12

Post by comprev » Mon, Jan 22, 2024, 2:22 PM UTC

shawnpang wrote: post #7

farseer wrote: post #6

There are SaaS companies from China and Russia that register and open their head office in US with token sales staff and retain the rest of their core engineering and management back home. You might not even notice it. Case in point: Bitrix24 is primarily a Russian company.

Singapore is often a choice for those Chinese companies as well. It's hard to define a "Chinese company". There are many Chinese Americans / Chinese Canadians doing business in North America, myself included. If all of their team members and the legal entity are in the US, are they still a Chinese company?

It’s probably easier to define “a Chinese company” as one which is under jurisdiction of CCP regardless of their geographical location - similar to a US citizen having to pay tax even if they never intend to touch US soil again.

Re: Ask HN: Do you trust SaaS software made by China teams?

#13

Post by comprev » Mon, Jan 22, 2024, 2:25 PM UTC

shawnpang wrote: post #9

leros wrote: post #3

I wouldn't use a Chinese SaaS simply out of fear that it might cause one my customers to not use my service. There are many Chinese things I would use but not SaaS software.

How would your customers find out about this tho.

When a customer requests an audit of your supply chain as part of their due diligence. For legal reasons they might want to know who _you_ do business with, for example in case of international sanctions.

Re: Ask HN: Do you trust SaaS software made by China teams?

#14

Post by solardev » Tue, Jan 23, 2024, 3:45 PM UTC

shawnpang wrote: post #9

leros wrote: post #3

I wouldn't use a Chinese SaaS simply out of fear that it might cause one my customers to not use my service. There are many Chinese things I would use but not SaaS software.

How would your customers find out about this tho.

If your company is subject to the GDPR, I think you have to list subprocessors and where they're located.

Also ping times will probably be an issue.

Re: Ask HN: Do you trust SaaS software made by China teams?

#15

Post by leros » Sat, Jan 27, 2024, 5:28 PM UTC

shawnpang wrote: post #9

leros wrote: post #3

I wouldn't use a Chinese SaaS simply out of fear that it might cause one my customers to not use my service. There are many Chinese things I would use but not SaaS software.

How would your customers find out about this tho.

There are several different audits a company might need to do. Having a Chinese SaaS as a vendor would definitely prevent me from passing certain audits and doing business with certain customers. At minimum, it would be something I have to disclose and it would be a talking point, so better to just avoid it for simplicity.