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Ask HN: What visa do foreign YC founders use to stay in US beyond 3 months?

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Re: Ask HN: What visa do foreign YC founders use to stay in US beyond 3 months?

#91

Post by alexro »

So, after reading all of the comments and some of the links and not being a lawyer, nor YC founder and residing outside of the US and just been there once on B1...

The plan:

* get to the US first on B1, quite easy to get and relatively applicable for YC

* while there, set up a US company and open a branch in your own country and make it to employ you officially

* continue to investigate your options and if young file for J1 (internship) or if older file for O1 (achievements) with references from other founders/VCs

* don't mess with H1B

* worst case scenario if you didn't apply for other kinds of VISA - leave the US and come back periodically on B1 if need be and continue to be employed in your home country by a branch of your company in the US. after a year or so apply for L1 (inter-company transfer) which is almost automatic to get and allows the spouse to work too.

Re: Ask HN: What visa do foreign YC founders use to stay in US beyond 3 months?

#92

Post by klipt »

falsedan wrote: post #77
klipt wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Technically E3 has a cap, but since only Australians can apply for it (as opposed to the whole world applying for H1-Bs) the cap has never been reached.

Yeah, the quota is 10k of which about 3-4k a year is used. Extensions don't count against the quota and are renewable indefinitely. Drawback is: non-permanent visa (so banks won't lend to you) & you can't have intent to stay (can't apply for greencard).

I got a mortgage on H1-B so I don't think non-permanency is necessarily a problem. I also know several people who have gone from E3 to green card: http://www.limaechoecho.com/2012/11/e-3-visa-to-green-card.h...

Re: Ask HN: What visa do foreign YC founders use to stay in US beyond 3 months?

#93

Post by netheril96 »

Pyxl101 wrote: post #85

What would be the downside of allowing anyone to immigrate to a country as long as they have qualified employment with compensation greater than a certain amount per year? (Let's say $75k or $100k or whatever makes a person an obvious net-bonus to society rather than net loss.) They can stay on that visa as long as they retain employment with any firm for that amount. If a person has demonstrated merit justifying a s…

For one, many locals will oppose it because the influx of additional workers may lower their compensation due to increased competition.

Re: Ask HN: What visa do foreign YC founders use to stay in US beyond 3 months?

#94

Post by adrianbg »

alexro wrote: post #91

So, after reading all of the comments and some of the links and not being a lawyer, nor YC founder and residing outside of the US and just been there once on B1... The plan: * get to the US first on B1, quite easy to get and relatively applicable for YC * while there, set up a US company and open a branch in your own country and make it to employ you officially * continue to investigate your options and if young file…

http://unshackled.co/ is working pretty well for me. YC's attitude toward foreign founders didn't inspire much confidence.

Re: Ask HN: What visa do foreign YC founders use to stay in US beyond 3 months?

#95

Post by mananm »

Hope this doesn't sound like a shameless plug, but this topic is really why Unshackled exists and why we are on a mission to enable as many immigrant founded companies in the US as we can.

As one of the founding partners of Unshackled (www.unshackled.co) I hope that we've been able to help immigrant founders build towards their dreams. It's still early, but in the past 7 months, we've supported 30 founders, across 13 teams, secured sponsorships of 5 different visa types and are working on 2 more (cap-exempt H1-B and H4 EAD). We are optimistic our model is good for teams with immigrant founders. Our next application closes on Oct 23 and hope that we can continue to support the best our country attracts.

More on our structure can be found here: http://unshackled.co/a-bigger-and-stronger-unshackled-is-her...

Re: Ask HN: What visa do foreign YC founders use to stay in US beyond 3 months?

#96

Post by mananm »

peterjlee wrote: post #24

I heard about a seed fund for foreign founders that will invest by hiring the founders and paying them salaries while sponsoring the founders' visa. So the salary is basically the seed fund. I can't remember their name so I'm not sure if they're still around or if it's even legal but I thought the idea was cool. Maybe YC can look into something like that? EDIT: found it. https://angel.co/unshackled

We are very much around. Hope to help more immigrants build great companies in the U.S.

Re: Ask HN: What visa do foreign YC founders use to stay in US beyond 3 months?

#97

Post by ahmeni »

adenot wrote: post #65

Although the visa discussion in this thread is healthy, nobody has yet answered the question. OP wants to know what visa do founders currently use, not available options.

Blindly following what other people have done for a situation rather than the appropriate path for your country/status/education/etc. is a fantastic way to get deported or denied entry.

OP should consider himself lucky for the contextual information rather than a stats dump.

Re: Ask HN: What visa do foreign YC founders use to stay in US beyond 3 months?

#98

Post by HistoryInAction »

Yeah, take a look at the USCIS Visa Guide: http://www.uscis.gov/eir/visa-guide/

There are lots of different options and none are all that good a fit for founders.

If you've got a year advance notice, you can set things up for the L-1. If you've got the ability to generate old media press and can raise $500k (rule of thumb), then O-1 is a good fit. If you're from the right country with $50k-150k, then E-2. If you're from Australia, E-3.

For the O-1 in particular, the three criteria we tend to use are media coverage, mentorship/conferences, and high salary for those who have been employed previously to becoming entrepreneurs.

YC asked the White House to make some tweaks to the O-1 to be a more straightforward path for founders, but the White House went in a different direction with something yet to be announced.

We have the Global EIR program which might be of assistance. Our flagship program in Boston: http://masstech.org/innovation-institute/projects-and-initia...

We have a pathway that takes advantage of cap-exemptions built into the H-1B program and partnerships with universities. It's pretty straightforward, and in exchange for a few months of part-time work, you'll draw a runway-extending salary and be sponsored for a work visa, after which you'll have a visa runway to raise capital more easily and then switch over to 100% startup time.

www.globaleir.org will have more in a short while.

Re: Ask HN: What visa do foreign YC founders use to stay in US beyond 3 months?

#99

Post by HistoryInAction »

flurp wrote: post #31
will_brown wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not knowing what YC actually does, my first 2 thoughts were: O-1 and J-1 Visas (certainly there could be other solutions) O-1: Typically I would think of athletes/entertainers, in the US for competition/show/tour/etc... It may not apply to some young founder getting into YC who has no other track record of success; however, YC/Tech are politically connected so the mere fact one is accepted into YC, it might = extraor…

I think J-1 would be the most legally correct (IANAL and all but I have some J-1 experience). YC should be able to bring founders on board. Since J-1 is for education and the program is basically an education. J-1 is also quite openly (ab)used to bring employees over who do not qualify for a H1B or O-1. Only important thing to remember is to pay the J-1 "student" otherwise they are (depending on origin country, but m…

Two year mandatory return for many origin countries can make J-1 messy.

Also, J-1 being run by State rather than DHS/USCIS introduces some extra weird things.

Re: Ask HN: What visa do foreign YC founders use to stay in US beyond 3 months?

#100

Post by mananm »

HistoryInAction wrote: post #98

Yeah, take a look at the USCIS Visa Guide: http://www.uscis.gov/eir/visa-guide/ There are lots of different options and none are all that good a fit for founders. If you've got a year advance notice, you can set things up for the L-1. If you've got the ability to generate old media press and can raise $500k (rule of thumb), then O-1 is a good fit. If you're from the right country with $50k-150k, then E-2. If you're f…

We've partnered with UMass to scale the Global EIR program -- https://www.umb.edu/news/detail/unshackled_and_global_entrep...
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