Outsourcing Startups

The point is you can hire devs with 10 years of experience in varying programing languages. Maybe I wasn't really clear on that. Also programing for iPhone is done in objective-c and android devs work with Java. Both of these have been around long before iOS and Android.

From my experiences outsourcing saves money but costs velocity. There is much time spent creating detailed specs, clarifying the specs, reviewing delivered code then immediately demanding key improvements made to that code, replacing subpar developers, pinging developers that have gone AWOL, and all of this happening with the usual timezone delays. Sometimes its faster to write the code yourself than it is to create painfully clear storyboards, wireframes, or demand yet another rewrite.

To avoid these hassles you have to spend a little more money to include a local manager to drive the outsourced team and be responsible for their delivery.

Honestly I get the sense that people who are happy with outsourced code are either unusually lucky to have found a highly skilled and responsive outsource, or more often they just not technical enough to judge the technical quality or the timeliness of what they are paying for. They are happy with the shiny car the outsourced team made and they can't realize the engine compartment is an absolute mess.

Just to offer a counter-anecdote, I've personally worked on two mobile projects that were outsourced overseas and came back completely botched. They had to be scrapped and started from scratch.

The main issue was communication and being able to have high-bandwidth face-to-face meetings to clarify what was needed. Extensive use of iChat and Skype didn't seem to help.

Some apps have detailed specs and a lot of upfront work has been done in reducing the ambiguities. Those are probably better candidates for outsourcing. But if the design is fluid and things need to be worked out as-you-go, that seems to be where outsourced projects go pear-shaped.

I personally think there's enough work to go around all over the world, but for certain types of apps you need to have someone you can meet and have a dialog with so you can iterate the design efficiently.

Obviously, each app is different and situations vary so YMMV.

To the latter point-- fair enough. There are some significant differences between Mac and iOS development, for example, but it seems that experienced Mac devs generally flourish in the iOS world. Are you saying that such people are readily available in Bulgaria? As in, you are confident that with some legwork, I could hire a guy with 10 years combined of Mac/iOS programming experience for 40k? If so, that's very interesting to me (no sarcasm).

Regarding the former, I would be extremely wary of paying a demonstrably "competent engineer" to do work in a platform they were not already immersed in. Total years programming, even on seemingly similar platforms, doesn't translate into ability to deliver a high quality, robust product on the target platform in a timely manner.

To give a specific example, successful iOS development requires a combination of UX design intuition and finesse, similar to what you'd need in web development, along with the memory management and performance tuning skills more typically seen in the embedded and C++ game development world. The reason competent iOS devs are expensive in America is because it's hard to find people with these combined skills, who don't want to just make their own stuff. There are many examples of lackluster apps in the iTunes Store where the developers clearly came up short in one of those areas.

"I am aware of the importance of Silicon Valley and VC money for startups"

I would rewrite that to "I am aware of the importance of SV and startups for VC money". IOW, the synergy which drives expenses up for SV startups makes VC money more important than elsewhere.

And, the idea that good hackers can only be found in SV is ridiculous.