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Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies

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41–50 of 112 posts

Re: Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies

#41
post #36

Sounds like a terrific idea. I saw the growth of this sort of thing in Argentina and other South American countries once some companies started investing time and money there. A fair amount of the popularity was attributed to sharing highly overlapping time zones with the US. I imagine this has a similar advantage for European customers. You may get some mileage out of talking with Globant ( https://globant.com ) or…

Yes! Totally right about the time zone benefits (although some of our talent is willing to adjust to US time zones, the employers rarely seem to believe it).

Also true about the fact that this sort of thing has sprouted in other regions, including South/Latin America. We've been trying to connect with them & share lessons learned because we think there's a big need in this space & we should all help each other succeed. I'm not sure I understand how Globant is similar to us though, is it an agency?

The ones we've spoken to so far that are pretty similar to ours (last-mile prep for job placement) include: PestoTech (engineers in India), PAZ.AI (refugees in Europe), Shift.org (veterans in USA), Insight Fellows (data science in USA), Talently.Tech (devs in LatAm), Laboratoria (women in LatAm), Outtalent (devs in Eastern Europe).

So far it seems to me that they're not far ahead of us, but nevertheless they've made enough progress to share some important lessons. First, it's important to start with and maintain quality. Quality for candidates means getting a job that's much better than what they would've gotten on their own, within 2-6 months of meeting our requirements. On the demand side, quality means that candidates meet or exceed the expectations of their standard talent selection process and performance post hire. Second, it's important to take a talent-first approach because that's what attracts the top talent. This includes being careful not to charge the talent an unreasonable rate. Employers may not all pay for the talent at the beginning when we're establishing our reputation, but ultimately that's where the main financial opportunity is - and charging a subscription fee ensures long-term mutually beneficial relationships.

Of course there's also the outsourcing agency/staff augmentation model that has existed for decades in Eastern Europe and South Asia... Andela is a more recent/visible example in Africa. Those are more easily profitable, but we've avoided that approach for now because we see that the top engineers prefer to work directly for great companies (whether remotely or on-site) and it is more beneficial for their career growth to do so.

Re: Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies

#42
post #38

Congrats on the launch, Laila and Iliana! Quick question: why are the companies with on-site jobs restricted to Europe and Canada (if they are in fact restricted)? Thanks!

Ah, that's not our restriction, that's the reality of visas for people from these countries. It's almost impossible for a junior engineer to get a visa to the United States. One of our candidates had a job offer at Amazon in the USA but couldn't get the visa. So he ended up at a startup in Germany instead.

So far our participants have ended up primarily in Germany and Poland, and we're seeing possibilities in Sweden, France, and the UK too. We're still figuring out what the Canadian visa situation is for junior engineers but it seems possible (probably best for them to apply for residency first and then get a job).

If you have any more insight on this do let us know!

Re: Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies

#43
It seems like there is correlation between patriarchal societies and having more women developers. I wonder why, maybe because anyway the society is patriarchal so there is not much difference between this field to others unlike in the west where all misogynist white males concentrate in this profession and all the good guys go to law or acting or wherever there are many women and everything is equal and rosy. But then you have to wonder why would those Arab women want to move to a horrible place like the western tech industry instead of removing their shackles and becoming a nurse in a hospital or work in HR of a big corporation, the places where women feel comfortable and equal in the west. It is a bit of a mystery.

Re: Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies

#44
post #21

Oh man, the name is unfortunate. It's slang for "babe" (for girls) in Greek. Also the last name of one of the most famous erotic comic artists (Milo Manara). Fun times!

oh yeah, we've heard about that recently from a Greek friend! Thankfully it seems like the Greek language is the only one in which our name has a weird meaning (at least so far), and hopefully it’s not offensive? Manara means “lighthouse” in Arabic. We did lots of user testing with various name options and this one was most positively perceived in Europe, North America, and MENA. Now we just need to get really great…

At least in Italy everyone would just think of the illustrator.

Re: Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies

#45
post #41
post #36

Sounds like a terrific idea. I saw the growth of this sort of thing in Argentina and other South American countries once some companies started investing time and money there. A fair amount of the popularity was attributed to sharing highly overlapping time zones with the US. I imagine this has a similar advantage for European customers. You may get some mileage out of talking with Globant ( https://globant.com ) or…

Yes! Totally right about the time zone benefits (although some of our talent is willing to adjust to US time zones, the employers rarely seem to believe it). Also true about the fact that this sort of thing has sprouted in other regions, including South/Latin America. We've been trying to connect with them & share lessons learned because we think there's a big need in this space & we should all help each other succee…

"how Globant is similar to us though"

Their business model isn't similar, but their methods are. They are a development house, somewhat similar to say, ThoughtWorks. But, they spend a lot of time with new hires, many straight from university, training them. Not just technically, but "US business speak/culture", helping them with the CV that's presented to potential clients, understanding schtick-of-the-day stuff like "Scaled Agile" and so on. And client-specific training, like how to speak FinTech, Insurance, Airline, or whatever.

Re: Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies

#46
post #45
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes! Totally right about the time zone benefits (although some of our talent is willing to adjust to US time zones, the employers rarely seem to believe it). Also true about the fact that this sort of thing has sprouted in other regions, including South/Latin America. We've been trying to connect with them & share lessons learned because we think there's a big need in this space & we should all help each other succee…

"how Globant is similar to us though" Their business model isn't similar, but their methods are. They are a development house, somewhat similar to say, ThoughtWorks. But, they spend a lot of time with new hires, many straight from university, training them. Not just technically, but "US business speak/culture", helping them with the CV that's presented to potential clients, understanding schtick-of-the-day stuff like…

Gotcha! That's great (and a good reminder for us to reconnect with ThoughtWorks too :) We'll have to see if Globant would be willing to share some lessons learned with us.

One of the problems we noticed in the Middle East & North Africa is a lack of agencies / development houses that do this at a high quality. In Eastern Europe lots of people go from college into a dev house for 2 years, and then qualify for great remote jobs (which usually require at least 2 years of experience).

We believe there's value to getting talent straight into the top tech companies, and that we will be able to develop a more scalable approach to teaching them these skills (communities are powerful & scale quickly). But it can be a challenge to get companies to hire engineers that have just graduated from college and have no work experience, so we'll need to find solutions to that. One approach that is working well for us is internships. Companies like Google have great programs and our talent has been doing really well interviewing for those opportunities.

Re: Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies

#47
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

oh yeah, we've heard about that recently from a Greek friend! Thankfully it seems like the Greek language is the only one in which our name has a weird meaning (at least so far), and hopefully it’s not offensive? Manara means “lighthouse” in Arabic. We did lots of user testing with various name options and this one was most positively perceived in Europe, North America, and MENA. Now we just need to get really great…

At least in Italy everyone would just think of the illustrator.

Oh man that's too bad! We have one partner in Italy so far (Bending Spoons) and they didn't mention this to us though... maybe that's a good sign, or maybe they were too embarrassed!

Re: Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies

#48

Speaking from the employer side, can you possibly mention some salary levels? I know the topic is sensitive and difficult, but giving some indication here or on the website would be great. This is hopefully competitive with other low-cost locations for react//dashboards/enterprise-java etc

Hi, no worries, thanks for asking! Curious what you’re seeing are the salary bands in competitive low-cost locations?

We’re currently most familiar with the bands in Palestine, Egypt, Jordan, and UAE. What we’re seeing there varies widely, but can probably be thought of as breaking down into two separate scales/salary bands: those paid by local companies and by international companies sourcing talent in the region primarily for affordability, and those paid by international companies sourcing talent in the region primarily because they need strong engineers.

In the former, the band for junior engineers straight out of college with no work experience is ~$800-$1800/month. In the latter, it’s $2500-$4500/month. For senior engineers, in the former it’s around $5k/month and in the latter it’s $6k-$10k/month.

Of course startups sometimes seek strong talent but can’t afford the range, so they may pay on the lower end but make up for it with equity, career growth, etc.

Re: Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies

#49
post #11

At Repl.it, we interviewed interns via Manara and was mind-blown by the quality. We've given offers to two and I know at least one will be joining us soon. I think Manara has a potential to transform the global developer market. Very excited for them!

Awww... I know they both loved Repl.it too - they love what you're building and Faris made a really positive impression on them!

Re: Launch HN: Manara (YC W21) – Connect Middle East engineers with global companies

#50
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know, right?! People who haven't experienced it don't get it. I think the knee-jerk reaction impacts Nigerians especially unfortunately. (My parents used to live in Nigeria and when my dad tried to buy something on eBay, they froze his account. Later when he lived in Venezuela, people were more sympathetic.) So are there any solutions we should be looking into beyond cash transfers / Western Union? Are any startups…

There's https://sendcash.africa - it uses cryptocurrency to facilitate transfers to (Nigerian and Ghanaian, but there are plans to expand throughout West Africa and beyond) bank accounts from anywhere. It's powered by Buycoins (YC S18) - maybe you could look into working with them?

Thank you! Will check in with them when we're exploring more robust payment solutions. Hopefully by then they'll have solved this problem & expanded to North Africa etc...
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