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Why Silicon Valley Immigrant Entrepreneurs Are Returning Home
11–20 of 91 posts
Re: Why Silicon Valley Immigrant Entrepreneurs Are Returning Home
#12Yet another Vivek Wadhwa story with his same pet theme. Here is my question: is there any Vivek Wadhwa story on this issue in which he shows detailed figures for NET immigration flows into and out of the United States in comparison to countries like China and India? Or does he consistently do as I have seen him do here and in other stories, relating individual anecdotes and asserting the existence of a problem (too f…
in which he shows detailed figures for NET immigration flows into and out of the United States in comparison to countries like China and India?
Funny, I was just coming to the comments page to say exactly this. The linked post is conspicuous for its lack of words like "study" or "statistics." Talking to a couple of random people does not qualify a trend that stretches to millions of people.
It's pretty obvious that the U.S. immigration system is fucked up and should be much improved. But you can't jump from that to the conclusion that so many immigrants are going home as to affect Silicon Valley.
Re: Why Silicon Valley Immigrant Entrepreneurs Are Returning Home
#13This is true not just for SV but also the biotech/pharma R&D sector. I personally know people who have already moved out of the US to places like Singapore and India, and are doing way better in terms of peace-of-mind, moving ahead with their lives, having kids, putting down roots etc. On the other hand, I know a few others who are much like nomads within the US, moving from job to job just to keep their H1-B visa st…
I personally know people who have already moved out of the US to places like Singapore and India May I ask some follow-up questions to make sure I understand your point of view on this issue? Are you referring to people who are originally from Singapore or India, or to people from third countries who settle in Singapore or India rather than settling in the United States? How does the number of those persons compare t…
Are you referring to people who are originally from Singapore or India, or to people from third countries who settle in Singapore or India rather than settling in the United States?
The people I know personally, who moved, are mostly from India, including one very close relative.
How does the number of those persons compare to the number of persons who stay in the United States after completing higher education?
Not a very large number, yet. But I have seen the upswing over the last 10 years that I have been in the US. I am not aware of any official statistics off the top of my head, but I would be very surprised if no one is tracking this quantitatively.
Why did you think originally that it was a good idea to study in the United States rather than in your country of citizenship?
When I first came to the US a decade ago, it was for a MS program in a field (bioinformatics) that was almost non-existent at the time in my home country (India). I worked with a drug-discovery start-up for a year after graduation but soon realized that career prospects in biotech/pharma research are way better with the letters PhD after your name and some serious publications on your resume. I hope to wrap-up and graduate this year.
Re: Why Silicon Valley Immigrant Entrepreneurs Are Returning Home
#14I am about to move to mountain view to create an american presence for my startup. This is simply because the rest of the world is way behind in adoption of new technology and helping entrepreneurs. But the visa issue is an exception to this forward thinking attitude.
Still, I will do my best to keep up a US presence because it is quite worth it.
Re: Why Silicon Valley Immigrant Entrepreneurs Are Returning Home
#15As an American I see this as a problem for America. However, there is a big upside to this. The rest of the world gets some of its talent back, which will help it develop faster. There are over 1 billion people in India, for example. They deserve to be more than a call center or a place to outsource for the US.
I disagree. The rest of the world gets talent back at the cost of those talented individuals. You are one individual starting a startup and the government, the people, everybody is against you. You must own a strong corporation with R&D centers to be able to swim against that tide. It's not for individual entrepreneurs. I think this way because I have been through it and now closing down in my home country, moving to the U.S.
How would you fix it? The leaders in those countries should fix it.
Re: Why Silicon Valley Immigrant Entrepreneurs Are Returning Home
#16While the tax and jobs benefits are there, I'm not sure it's that big a deal. IT companies create less jobs per revenue dollar than traditional industries, do their manufacturing in asia and shift significant operations to overseas tax havens when they get big. It's not that I'm saying the US doesn't benefit from high tech startups, just that the effect is somewhat muted.
On the other hand, with such a majority of the world's service providers concentrated in just a few west coast cities I think there are some risks for the global Internet. What if someday we all found out that facebook, twitter and google were all collaborating with the government in a massive warrantless wiretap program ala AT&T et al. Wouldn't you be happier knowing there were some viable competitors out there based in .au .tw .ch .in etc? Is it possible that would have prevented it from happening to begin with? I'm not saying that's likely, but clearly there could be some benefits to a more politically and physically distributed infrastructure. What happens to the world if the US triggers their Internet kill switch? A lot more than when .ly did presumably. What if the world misses out on the next big thing because of the tight knit group think that exists in the bay area capital scene? Mother of all earthquakes? State government collapses? Dirty bomb?
I'm not saying I'd bet on any of those happening, or that SV isn't a good place to start a tech firm, or that anyone should pack up and leave. Just that I wouldn't shed many tears if I saw more of http://thenextsocialhotness.eu/
Monocultures can be pretty fragile when exposed to a brand new threat.
Re: Why Silicon Valley Immigrant Entrepreneurs Are Returning Home
#17[deleted]
Re: Why Silicon Valley Immigrant Entrepreneurs Are Returning Home
#18Yet another Vivek Wadhwa story with his same pet theme. Here is my question: is there any Vivek Wadhwa story on this issue in which he shows detailed figures for NET immigration flows into and out of the United States in comparison to countries like China and India? Or does he consistently do as I have seen him do here and in other stories, relating individual anecdotes and asserting the existence of a problem (too f…
You can find his more data-focused writing here -- http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=7387...
Re: Why Silicon Valley Immigrant Entrepreneurs Are Returning Home
#19Yet another Vivek Wadhwa story with his same pet theme. Here is my question: is there any Vivek Wadhwa story on this issue in which he shows detailed figures for NET immigration flows into and out of the United States in comparison to countries like China and India? Or does he consistently do as I have seen him do here and in other stories, relating individual anecdotes and asserting the existence of a problem (too f…
It is difficult for foreigners to start companies in the EU, even modulo the fact that it's somewhat difficult for residents to start companies in parts of the EU.
I don't know anything about Asian immigration, but I know a very little bit about EU policies, and I don't think they're a competitive threat to us here.
Re: Why Silicon Valley Immigrant Entrepreneurs Are Returning Home
#20America has a lot of cute women. (hint)