Startup Visas Are a Great Idea!

February 14, 2013 By

Congress is currently considering a bill that would provide 75,000 visas to persons who currently hold H-1B or F-1 student visas who have started businesses with investment of at least $100,000 and that employ at least 2 other people within a year and at least five in the following three years.

The bill, the Immigration Innovation Act, received support from President Obama in his State of the Union speech. [Read more…]

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A Tale of Two Incorporations

February 7, 2013 By

I filed an incorporation mid-December, and just received the acceptance notice from the State of California today, nearly two months later. I could have gotten it back sooner, but we had some time and wanted to avoid the $500-1000 expedite fees charged by the California Secretary of State.

But that seems to be the new normal here in California: If you want to form a business, it will take two months to do so, unless you pay an expedite fee on top of your regular fees and taxes. [Read more…]

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New Global Entrepreneurs

December 12, 2012 By

My trip to Colombia was an opportunity for reflection on the new model of emerging companies: products and companies born in one part of the world that gain traction and investment with relocation to Silicon Valley.  Generally speaking, in the past few years we have seen a number of entrepreneurs choose to take a very deliberate strategy in attempting to build a global company:

  1. Develop a product and gain some traction in their country of origin.
  2. Incorporate a company in Delaware, contribute the IP to the new company.
  3. Move business HQ to San Francisco Bay Area to seek investors, partners and customers, all the while participating in Silicon Valley’s unique startup culture. Meanwhile, the company’s development team remains in the country of origin, which reduces development costs and  provides competitive advantages to the business. [Read more…]
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Presentations in Medellin, Colombia

November 30, 2012 By

Next week I’ll be in Medellin, Colombia attending the Outsource 2 Latin America & Caribbean conference and meeting with clients and partners.

I’ll be giving a talk at Espacio, the new co-working space in Medellin on Dec. 6th at 6p. I’ll be presenting on “Preparing to Seek Capital from Silicon Valley Investors.”

If you are in Medellin for the conference, come on by!

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