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Forging a Swiss Lens: How Zurich's tech scene changed my view of SV

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Re: Forging a Swiss Lens: How Zurich's tech scene changed my view of SV

#71

Post by dbrgn »

soperj wrote: post #42
timewarrior wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine you build an AirBnb like solution limited to Switzerland market. AirBnb will eventually come and eat your lunch. In today's globalized world - if you are not one of the bigger players and do not have moat (govt contract, some other kind of exclusivity) - other bigger players will come after you.

You say that, but there are cases even in small countries where this didn't happen. Like trademe in New Zealand which was just like ebay. Ebay still hasn't become the major place to do auctions in new zealand.

In Switzerland, ricardo.ch is much bigger than Ebay.

Re: Forging a Swiss Lens: How Zurich's tech scene changed my view of SV

#72

Post by timewarrior »

soperj wrote: post #42
timewarrior wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine you build an AirBnb like solution limited to Switzerland market. AirBnb will eventually come and eat your lunch. In today's globalized world - if you are not one of the bigger players and do not have moat (govt contract, some other kind of exclusivity) - other bigger players will come after you.

You say that, but there are cases even in small countries where this didn't happen. Like trademe in New Zealand which was just like ebay. Ebay still hasn't become the major place to do auctions in new zealand.

Bigger a part of your business software is, faster the growth happens.

Ebay like marketplaces still have a big physical world component present. Even if it isn't ebay, it might be some other company in Australia. Or maybe trademe becomes the company which tries to take over in Austrlia. It's inevitable and just a matter of time!

Re: Forging a Swiss Lens: How Zurich's tech scene changed my view of SV

#73

Post by haeffin »

timewarrior wrote: post #65
Karrot_Kream wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't read the bit about the South Bay but that's absurd. gRPC - Mountain View Cgroups - Mountain View Golang, Rust - Mountain View Protobufs - Mountain View Blaze - Mountain View React - Menlo Park Buck - Menlo Park Thrift - Menlo Park And this is only a fraction of it. Do you even work in tech? You sound like a talking head...

Quite a few of these were produced out of Google and FB, so it makes sense they would be based out of MV/Meno Park. However most of the unicorns or near unicorns since 2010 have been based in SF. Dropbox, AirBnb, Uber, Lyft, Stripe, Zenefits, SoFi, Credit Karma, CloudFlare, DocuSign, Wish, Slack, Github, Instacart, Prosper, Automattic, Eventbrite, Okta, Docker, Gusto, Nextdoor. Let list could go on and on. I stand by…

That's lots of names of companies and no examples of "best technology building best practices".

Re: Forging a Swiss Lens: How Zurich's tech scene changed my view of SV

#75

Post by maehwasu »

hobo_mark wrote: post #59
electricslpnsld wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Zurich pay can eclipse Valley pay. I have friends who went to ETH for grad school and were getting close to 100k CHF a year. This is grad school -- the pay goes up from there.

On the other hand, you will need that much to live there! Take this 250k googler, he's more frugal than anyone I know and yet they spend 90k/yr living in Zuerich. http://retireinprogress.com/2017-q4/

If you read the post, he spent $27K on two wedding ceremonies, and $10K on a huge trip (presumably his honeymoon).

Actual "normal" cost was closer to $50K.

Re: Forging a Swiss Lens: How Zurich's tech scene changed my view of SV

#76

Post by timewarrior »

Karrot_Kream wrote: post #46
timewarrior wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to be in SF and in South Bay. Recently moved to Seattle , closely associated to the India and Swiss tech ecosystem. In my experience further away you are from SF, less cutting edge you are. In my experience even South Bay is 6 months behind SF. SF is a big melting pot, where a huge amount of talent are trying out new things and they are open to sharing their experiences - be it about latest technologies or lat…

What does "cutting edge" mean? They don't use modern deployment startegies? They don't use recently popular web frameworks? "Cutting edge" is so vague it's not clear whether SV just cargo cults more or whether it's actually more technically innvovative.

Maybe bleeding edge is a better word.

They just try a lot more things and find out faster what is working and what isn't working. Most of them turn out to be useless but the ones that work give them an early start.

Re: Forging a Swiss Lens: How Zurich's tech scene changed my view of SV

#77

Post by kzrdude »

dwc wrote: post #39
timewarrior wrote: post #3

I have been involved with Swissnex and been advising Swiss startups for some time. I also go to Switzerland every other year if not every year and meet with startups there. Things I noticed: 1. Incredibly smart people. 2. Behind Silicon Valley on best technology and product building practices by at least 2 years. 3. Great work ethic and social responsibility. 4. Do not have world conquering ambitions - which kinda wo…

> We are Swiss, we don't conquer the world. I am curious what such Swiss people think of Nestlé, then. Or other companies and industries where Switzerland has a prominent global reputation? I would just chalk it up to personal preferences and motivations, but the statement as written suggests it's a Swiss thing in general.

You know, it's most likely said with a cheeky smile and a play on ones own stereotypes.

Re: Forging a Swiss Lens: How Zurich's tech scene changed my view of SV

#78

Post by Karrot_Kream »

timewarrior wrote: post #65
Karrot_Kream wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't read the bit about the South Bay but that's absurd. gRPC - Mountain View Cgroups - Mountain View Golang, Rust - Mountain View Protobufs - Mountain View Blaze - Mountain View React - Menlo Park Buck - Menlo Park Thrift - Menlo Park And this is only a fraction of it. Do you even work in tech? You sound like a talking head...

Quite a few of these were produced out of Google and FB, so it makes sense they would be based out of MV/Meno Park. However most of the unicorns or near unicorns since 2010 have been based in SF. Dropbox, AirBnb, Uber, Lyft, Stripe, Zenefits, SoFi, Credit Karma, CloudFlare, DocuSign, Wish, Slack, Github, Instacart, Prosper, Automattic, Eventbrite, Okta, Docker, Gusto, Nextdoor. Let list could go on and on. I stand by…

You're naming products or companies and not technologies or processes. Moreover many of these companies are privately traded and their balance sheet is unknown. These companies could be healthy or they could be struggling and we have no idea.

So what is your metric of "cutting edge"? It sounds like you're optimizing for small business strategy? Seems honestly like VC funding is the biggest indicator here.

Re: Forging a Swiss Lens: How Zurich's tech scene changed my view of SV

#79

Post by workthrowaway27 »

matttproud wrote: post #30

Zürich > Silicon Valley or San Francisco (esp. if you have a family) Zürich is a great place to work, live, and relax. The people here are also stupendously awesome.

How easily can a US citizen find work there?

Re: Forging a Swiss Lens: How Zurich's tech scene changed my view of SV

#80

Post by fuzzieozzie »

nextstep wrote: post #45
fuzzieozzie wrote: post #6

That lifestyle is possible in SV too .. it's a matter of how you choose priorities. At www.compilerworks.com we are purposefully bootstrapped to enable a high quality lifestyle (there are 3 of us in the Bay Area and 5 internationally).

I can work in SV and use great, reliable public transportation to get everywhere I want in my life, often in under an hour? And I can have 5 weeks paid vacation per year? I wasn't able to find these things when I lived there...

It exists -- but it is not the norm, especially in VC backed companies. VC demand returns, and prefer to see $100 today compared with $100 in a year's time!
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