Ask YC: Where to startup? (If not the US, then Canada or UK?)

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=174298

by aditya • 18 years ago

27 62 18 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

Given all the recent confusion and criticism of the US immigration fuc^Wpolicies, I'm wondering what everyone thinks is the best place outside the US to startup, and why?

I know there's a pretty strong startup scene now in Canada and parts of Europe but if you were starting out, which would you prefer? The following reasons are based on my VERY limited understanding and experience with both these places, so feel free to correct, etc.

Vancouver, BC

Pros: Proximity to Seattle/Silicon Valley, good startup/entrepreneurial scene

Cons: Bad weather, Bureaucracy, VCs are more risk-averse compare to SV, labor laws

London, UK

Pros: Burgeoning startup scene, situated mid-way between continental US and Europe (not sure why this is a pro), tech friendly VCs

Cons: Bad weather, labor laws, expensive (!!)

Any other places to consider?

xenoterracide• 18 years ago

well I (here in US) finally found a co-founder (which I hope turns out to be a good decision) in the UK. I'm not sure how we're going to make it work, but I think on advantage may be that if he gets venture capital in the UK it's worth ~twice as much if I spend it here.

akuhn• 18 years ago

Switzerland!!!

nraynaud4• 18 years ago

Yes, I spent 2 years by the Swiss border and I went there a couple of times, it seems a fine country but expensive (and the interesting part speaks german, and they are not in the euro area). They have very good public transportation system, banks everywhere (but I don't know about VC stuff), mountains.

wallflower3• 18 years ago

Strongly considering Argentina.

Pros: No work visa required. Affordable lifestyle (eating out, tango clubs, outdoor events, music). Cost of living fairly low ($10k/yr reasonable living burn rate), Buenos Aires one of the world's largest metropolitan areas. Burgeoning expatriate population (pro or con, depending).

Cons: Distance from family and friends (but some have said they'd love to visit!). Distance from established networks. Virtual business dealings. You need to learn another language to effectively be part of the community (not a programming one, a real language, Spanish and maybe their local hybrid).

nraynaud4• 18 years ago

The last time a friend of mine went there for work (I personally only went there for an internship with a 90days tourist visa to avoid embassy bullshit), they asked him to apply for a visa with a bureaucracy like the one we have here in France : "you have to go back to France to apply for the visa there in the Paris embassy".

If you want a economically more active country, you might consider Chile too, but I don't know anything about visas there.

wallflower3• 18 years ago

Hmm. Good to know. Overstaying tourist visas seems like a gray area.

kirubakaran• 18 years ago

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=129037

truebosko3• 18 years ago

Who cares where you startup? Some of the best startups have come from non-startup towns, like Shopify.com from Ottawa

But to support the topic, here's some cities in eastern Canada where I think the startup culture is growing/swell:

- Toronto, Ontario

Pros: Great community, lots of get togethers and Barcamps. Good overall scene

Cons: Crappy weather, rent and space costs are high.

- Waterloo, Ontario

Pros: Good community (Been to several Startup meets), a lot of younger people (It's a town with two major Universities in it plus a college) and a lot of cool more tech-oriented startups coming out of it. Cost of living is pretty cheap, nice small town. Lots of VC's in the area from what I've seen

Cons: Perhaps a bit TOO small of a town (Only 90,000 people)

- Montreal, Ontario

Pros: Great european culture in the city itself. Awesome startup scene with lots of get togethers. Great technology and apps coming out of it already. Lots of people deeming Montreal the "Silicon Valley of Canada" (And yes, I know it can't compare AT ALL). Pretty cheap considering how big it is

Cons: The city itself may not be for some people. Very busy.

Hope that helps. Go Canada startups! :-)

ojbyrne2• 18 years ago

Better speak French if you choose Montreal because of the language laws. Otherwise you might be in for a shock when you discover that speaking English is not an acceptable job requirement.

wallflower3• 18 years ago

My friend has been studying French for years and is quaking at the thought of the Test de connaissance du français

truebosko3• 18 years ago

That's true, but a lot of people in the core of Montreal also speak fluent English and there doesn't seem to be much attitude towards English speaking people (in that area)

And hey, French isn't too hard to learn :)

r7000• 18 years ago

Bill 101 kicks in after 50 employees. Not really an issue for startups!

lpgauth• 18 years ago

Most of the startup stuff going on in Montreal is all in English.

izaidi• 18 years ago

Montreal seems like the place to be if you're starting small. Vancouver might have a stronger talent base but their startup culture is a little top-heavy -- it's mostly VCs and angels spinning off their own ideas, whereas in Montreal there's a vibrant startup community and VCs are actively seeking early-stage concepts to invest in (like here: http://montrealstartup.com/). And yeah, it's a beautiful city and housing is really cheap. I'd move there if I could but the only startups looking to hire talent are the well-funded ones in Vancouver.

mrtron2• 18 years ago

Montreal has some great VCs, but for early stage funding I think Waterloo is actually the most forward looking.

I don't know enough about Vancouver's scene to know the differences that way.

ArcticCelt• 18 years ago

I live in Montreal and I can only see advantages. Incorporation in Canada is simple and dirt cheap, cost of living in Montreal generally low(food + rent for me around 600$), you can have a small office for a ridiculous price (200$ for office with a shared conference room and reception). Fun city to relax and go out.

VC's? Who cares? If you reach the size to start looking for VC then move to another city if yoi think it's so important.

acangiano• 18 years ago

I assume you mean Montreal, Quebec.

truebosko3• 18 years ago

Yes, just a typo due to too much Ontario in my post!

mrtron2• 18 years ago

I agree. Waterloo is a great for startup, Toronto is a great city with lots of entrepreneurs, and Montreal is pretty great too excluding the language barrier.

On that note, I wouldn't mind meeting up with smart folks to talk shop - any suggestions? Are the Barcamps good?

lux• 18 years ago

Winnipeg, Manitoba

Pros: We're in Canada for one, low cost of living (compared to anywhere in North America), great people, central time zone (only a couple hours off either coast), and a growing startup scene (www.manitobanewmedia.com)

Cons: Pretty cold in the winter (not that much worse than elsewhere in Canada though, I'm from Windsor, Ontario and at least it's a dry cold here!). Not many startup-minded people. The scene here is really small still, and it's tough to find coding talent here in general, and even harder to find ones who would work well in a startup.

Winnipeg is a great city for the arts as well, with some really cool stuff going on in music, film, etc. I find it a creatively inspiring city with a unique culture compared to the rest of Canada and the US. So I may not have the same volume of geek surrounding me ;), but Winnipeg provides creative influences of a different sort which I can see have definitely influenced some of my business ideas in a good way.

Go Canada! :)

m0nty• 18 years ago

You might find the UK is about to have a "nasty turn" WRT the lending crisis, increasing inflation and rising fuel costs. Taxes are very high also, and the government seem a bit clueless about the relationship between high earners and entrepreneurship, eg:

http://telegraph.decenturl.com/non-domicile-tax-charge

All in all, not a bad place to live and do business but it might get worse, not better, for a few years.

sharpshoot• 18 years ago

London actually is starting to trump Boston in terms of Startup community quality. Strong in online advertising, gaming and mobile sectors. Super high quality investors here (Atomico, Index, Accel). Its expensive here, but if you want to take on an untapped market and expand your horizons, this is a tough yet good place to start.

lanej0• 18 years ago

Hey, I take exception to the bad weather comment! We're currently having a very nice spring. Lots of flowers.

Yeah, I think the Valley has a certain magic to it, but if you're outside of there, and have no plans to move, it doesn't really matter where you end up.

I've got a friend that moved to Panama (not to do a startup, but to work remotely). He loves it because his cost of living is low, it's got great infrastructure and a very nice climate.

mixmax2• 18 years ago

And don't forget a great banking sytem.

;-)

tom_rath• 18 years ago

Canada is very business friendly, so drop that 'bureaucracy' concern. Forming a corporation took about 24 hours, with most of that time spent waiting for corporate name approval. Everything (except for getting a lawyer to notarize a form -- about $25 or so and five minutes of my time) was done online and there are TONS of resources to help start up. I think I spent around $200 in total to get all the corporate paperwork filed -- it was trivial.

This site will provide all the information you need: http://corporationscanada.ic.gc.ca/epic/site/cd-dgc.nsf/Intr...

Annual corporate paperwork takes me just a few minutes each year (all done online) and taxes are likewise easy to put together. Any questions I've had about the company, taxes, etc. were quickly answered either through the Corporations Canada web site or after a brief e-mail dashed off to their contact e-mail address.

As a sole founder of a software startup, I really couldn't be happier at my (by accident of birth) choice of nation. I've been able to just focus on building a business and quickly deal with the legal and tax stuff as minimally needed.

mixmax2• 18 years ago

Does anyone have any experiences about Berlin?

I'm thinking about going there.

davidw2• 18 years ago

YC user 'wheels' is there - ask him (he's often on #startups, too).

danw2• 18 years ago

What's #startups?

maryrosecook• 18 years ago

Insanely cheap (nice meal out = 5 Euros), loads of alternative stuff: squats, parties, gigs etc. Very young, very friendly. Not sure about the start-up scene.

wheels• 18 years ago

I've just started mingling in the Berlin startup scene:

There's a lot of copying of the American tech market, retargeted towards a German market. That makes some investors here a bit conservative since "the proven model" is so unambitious. But there are VCs and Angels here in town and quite a few startups. Living is freakishly cheap for a European metropolis and in general it's a very attractive place to live.

Here's a map of startups registered on Deutsche Startups:

http://www.deutsche-startups.de/2007/11/29/berlin-ist-die-st...

pkaler2• 18 years ago

I live in Vancouver and just started a game studio. http://smartfulstudios.com

Bureaucracy is not a problem. I'm not sure what you mean by that.

There is tons of government help with SRED, IRAP, the Renaissance Fund, and Telefilm New Media Fund. http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/taxcredit/sred/menu-e.html http://irap-pari.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/ http://www.cse.gov.bc.ca/ProgramsAndServices/BusinessService... http://www.telefilm.gc.ca/03/311.asp?fond_id=3

With UBC and SFU, there is a lot of tech and business talent. Vancouver Film School and Emily Carr add to the art talent.

Since we have universal health insurance, and a fairly decent social safety net, it is actually cheaper to provide benefits to your employees in a lot of cases.

Vancouver is an expensive city to live in. But definitely not as expensive as the valley.

The infrastructure is good. I can get a 50Mbps internet connection in my apartment.

The women are gorgeous and fit. Skiing, sailing, golfing, climbing, hiking amenities are close by.

Yeah, it drizzles for 4 months of the year. But you get used to it.

The VCs are very approachable. Send any of them an email with the subject header, "30 Minute, no harm, no foul meeting" and they will hear you out.

If you're trying to get from zero to fundable, check out my friends over at Bootup Labs. http://bootuplabs.com/

huhtenberg2• 18 years ago

I can echo what pkaler said.

I personally received a handful of unsolicited phone calls from local VCs (including Growthworks and Ventures West - the one with Paul Kedrosky) asking for a meeting. All based on a couple of posts in high-profile blogs.

It does drizzle in a winter, but (a) that's actually helpful if you need to work :) (b) Whistler is just an hour away. There's also Okanagan Valley 400 km to the east, which is our smaller version of Napa Valley.

What's completely out of whack here is a real estate market. 500 sqft condo in downtown may easily cost 700k and CAD:USD is now 1:1. The correction of the market has already started, sales are slumping, inventory is spiking, but it would probably take at least a year for prices to start really falling. I'm mentioning this because this causes certain problem with rentals availability and this problem may actually worsen. Especially in Downtown. Make sure to research this subject prior to making a decision.

Another note is regarding the labor laws. BC actually has a funny law saying that if an employee owns a company share or is on an stock purchase plan - they are considered co-owners of the company and therefore are not eligible for an overtime pay. Allegedly this law was passed specifically to stimulate high-tech industry.

Lastly, if you haven't visited Vancouver before, I would strongly recommend a surveying visit. This is not a megapolis, it's not fast paced nor is it expansive. This may require adapting to.

elai• 18 years ago

There is also another part of the the labour laws that 'high technology professionals' are exempt from a good chunk of the employment act (like overtime and stat-holiday pay) in BC.

http://www.coop.uvic.ca/assets/pdf/engrcoop/engr_prep_highte...

sp• 18 years ago

Having visited Vancouver I can echo, as an outside, that the women are great :-)

Emmjaykay• 18 years ago

"The women are gorgeous and fit."

Way to enforce the stereo type, bro

pkaler2• 18 years ago

If you need me to elaborate, I can point you at statistics. Vancouver has one of the lowest rates of smoking and obesity and one of the highest life expectancies. Surely, that correlates with gorgeous and fit.

Brendon• 18 years ago

Thanks for the plug Parveen (I'm one of the guys behind Bootup Labs)

To elaborate on SRED and IRAP: These are programs that will either offset tax on revenue, or provide direct grants for original research and development. Talking with one of the local CTOs up here, he said use of these two programs basically cut his development costs by 70 to 80% versus Silicon Valley. Basically, there's a fair amount of free government money to be had to get you going, or stretch your funding further.

I actually just returned here from Silicon Valley (lived in Mountain View for four years). There's a couple reasons I did, mostly because Silicon Valley is an echo chamber that confuses motion with progress, but also because Vancouver has a lot to offer:

1) Diverse population ethnicity: if you're thinking about going into China, India, or Europe, it helps to have a lot of local knowledge of those cultures.

2) Lots of local talent: For one, the largest Electronics Arts development center in the world. For a second, a number of "Silicon Valley" companies and thought leaders - Tim Bray (creator of XML), Flock (has a team of 20 devs on Vancouver Island), Lloyd Budd (Automattic), many others.

3) Healthy life: I lost 15 pounds in two months when I returned to Vancouver, without really changing much. The city is a walking city, so we have only used a single tank of gas in th past four months. There's lots of cheap transit.

4) Close to Silicon Valley: YVR is actually the largest airport on the west coast (not LAX). You can be in Silicon Valley in two hours. I often joked with my valley friends that I could fly to Vancouver and drive to Whistler faster than they could get to Lake Tahoe. ;-)

As for living expense - overall, it's about the same as Silicon Valley. Some stuff costs more, some stuff less. The stuff that does cost more, you usually get a lot more bang for your buck. $800K will get you a shack in Mountain View, or a brand new modern apartment in downtown Vancouver in the heart of the action.

huhtenberg2• 18 years ago

> 3) Healthy life: I lost 15 pounds in two months when I returned to Vancouver, without really changing much.

I actually gained 15 kilos in a year after moving here from another country.

> The city is a walking city,

No, of course it's not. Except for some parts of the Downtown and a couple of other (smallish) areas. But restricting your life to just these areas is not really an option on average.

> so we have only used a single tank of gas in th past four months.

I am filling up every few days even though I telecommute and don't drive to/from work every day. The city of course is not a huge metropolis, there's a bit over 1 mil people here. But only a very small fraction of population can actually live comfortably without a car, and even between these people this lifestyle choice still does not really appeal to that many.

> There's lots of cheap transit.

$5 a pop hardly qualifies as a cheap transit.

itay• 18 years ago

You could also try Israel - anywhere between Haifa and Tel Aviv. Living costs are much lower, it is easier to get work visas, and the entire tech sector is based around a startup mentality. It also has a vibrant VC community.

plaggypig• 18 years ago

Baghdad, Iraq - although it may be "slightly" dangerous and has no dependable infrastructure, if you manage to get up and running successfully then you'll receive tens of millions of dollars worth of free publicity from freedom-loving news media and be the new darling of Silicon Valley upon your safe return. Risk/reward is probably about what VC's are used to anyway!

pierrefar• 18 years ago

I would strongly suggest Cambridge, UK. Lots of good VCs, great talent pool, and close to London.

mlinsey• 18 years ago

Go wherever you have access to the best talent pool. If you know lots of good people where you currently are, that's as good a place as any.

symptic• 18 years ago

I think people focus too much on the wheres and hows and who's too much when coming up with an idea and building it.

What it comes down to is -will you actually bring this idea into a reality-?

Get it made. Get it out. Then move if the need arises.

nraynaud4• 18 years ago

I moved by the sea to create my venture, I'm not shooting to get rich quick, I want a better life. For me getting a better life meant going surfing as much as possible.

I can't imagine throwing everything for my startup, I already left behind my friend, familly and my ex-girlfriend, I won't kill my way of living standard too. I suppose it is legitimate for other people to seek a place on other criteria like where I find VCs or other people like me or mountain, or night clubs etc. and do their venture for a living.

aditya4• 18 years ago

True. But, if you're looking to quit your day job and move to an immigration friendly country, being in a startup hub there is definitely a big plus.

ideas1012• 18 years ago

Canada is a great place for a startup except VCs - if u r planning to get VC involved then u might have a tough time ... u may certainly get the meeting appointment but not the funds. Also angel funding is minimum. I don't know what kind of corporation u need to form (compared to Delaware C/S corp) but it may not be as advantageous as Delaware corp. Legal and tax laws are very straight forward. Proximity to USA will certainly help but dont know whether VCs from US would be interested in canadian firm ... if u r planning to hire hackers then u can find best brains here.

ideas1012• 18 years ago

also visit http://www.startupnorth.ca/

raju• 18 years ago

Hey Aditya, This may sound off topic, but I followed your profile to your website so that I could find a way to contact you offline. Unfortunately, I could not get to the About page (and could not go to any of the articles or the comments page). So i am resorting to dropping you a line here. I was hoping we could talk, so drop me a email if you are interested. Email's in my profile.

Oh! And thanks for posting this question. I too was thinking along similar lines, and this answered some.

aditya4• 18 years ago

Couldn't see your email, but I've added mine to my profile -- feel free to drop me a note!

jaaron• 18 years ago

Hong Kong

Pros: Modern city, great public transportation, access to China, low taxes, cheap and easy to setup business

Cons: Very small (but growing!) tech sector, limited and competitive market for local skilled employees, few tech VCs, cost of living can be (but doesn't have to be) expensive.

I'd love to hear from anyone interested in the Hong Kong startup scene. (farra-NOSPAM at apache dot org)

yeti2• 18 years ago

I'd agree with this. Good tax system, government support, close to China etc... let me know if you need any feedback, my startup is based here

menloparkbum• 18 years ago

I'm unfamiliar with how the rest of the world works when it comes to immigration and entrepreneurship. Is it difficult to start a startup in Canada or London if you aren't already Canadian or a resident of the UK?

aditya4• 18 years ago

Both Canada and the UK are much easier to _immigrate_ to (especially if you're well educated) compared to the US, which was the original reason behind starting this thread.

I think you can get your permanent resident status in both countries in < 2 years, whereas in the US it could take anywhere from 2-8 years depending on where you're from (really bad if you're Indian/Chinese) and what phase the moon is in :)

sl956• 18 years ago

Depends where you are from. In the UK, it can be up to 5 years before getting permanent resident status.

aditya4• 18 years ago

BTW, Where are all the UK startuppers? I know Auctomatic was founded there, then moved to the valley and now to Vancouver...

pageman• 18 years ago

what about Madrid, Spain? http://money.cnn.com/2008/04/22/smbusiness/small_global_spai...

manmanic• 18 years ago

From an economic perspective, you want somewhere with a high standard of living (to support the necessary infrastructure), but a low cost of living (the $ you make over the Internet are disconnected from the local economy.)

On this basis the UK is far from ideal - it's an expensive country where the $ doesn't get you far. For this reason the talent in London goes into banking, law and medicine, where the fat salaries are.

Tiger economies like Hong Kong, South Korea, Taiwan and Israel are much better suited - they offer advanced tech infrastructure, but a much lower cost of living. In Israel for example, the talented head for tech in their droves, since it's the best paying sector in the economy.

yeti2• 18 years ago

I agree, HK is great - low cost and good infrastructure, access to great, English speaking and globally aware talent

Ask YC: Where to startup? (If not the US, then Canada or UK?)

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