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Ask HN: Landing a job with a startup in the valley

7 points| tempprofile | 14 years ago | reply

I am based off India. I am a Ruby and Rails hacker and a good one in that. I have published a couple of open source gems and have been programming professionally for over 10 years. I have worked with a wide variety of programming languages like Java, C#, Python and Rails. I have been a champion of open source right from the early days of my career. I have worked with corporates and have also run my own consulting business. I am a language geek and pride myself on the ability to pick up a new language/technology in a matter of weeks. I write technical blogs and conduct Rails workshops in my city. I am quite active in local technology forums and give talks on technologies such as Rails, Backbone.js, Node.js, MongoDB and whatever is in vogue and catches my fancy.

I would like to move to the US and work in the valley for a funded and promising startup. There seems to be a lot of action in the valley around startups and technology in general. I feel that I am missing out on all the action sitting in India.

I know that I have been intentionally vague and have used a temporary profile to post this. I wanted an honest feedback on the feasibility of finding a job in the valley as an Indian and the realities of moving there. I have read a whole bunch of articles and posts on the immigration woes. I wanted to know if there are any startups who have successfully employed Indians and have had them move to the valley. Also I wanted to find out if any immigrant Indians who have had experience moving to the valley and working for a startup. I know that the other route is to work for some soulless three letter indian company and have the H1B sponsored. But I cannot put up with their bureaucracy and I most definitely do not want to work for a bank.

2 comments

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[+] threwaway|14 years ago|reply
OK. I am also from India and looking to move to the valley to join a competent start-up.

I have built some prototypes that can be readily looked at if someone wishes so. Sadly, it has never come to that level. There is an initial excitement from the other end that quickly fizzles out after they learn that I am Indian and they need to sponsor a H1B. I think the process might be bit more drawn out compared so someone from say, the EU. I don't know. Borders suck.