startupvisa.com -- good idea or not?

[SivaGanesha 2]

What do people think of:

http://www.startupvisa.com/

The basic idea is that if a non-American entrepreneur can attract $250k in venture/angel funding, of which $100k must come from US sources, they can get a visa to come to the USA to start their company.

It sounds like the proponents of this idea are making a great sound bite of it--saying that how can we refuse these immigrants--they are going to create jobs, just what we need right now, yada, yada, yada.

However, although I'm a big fan of entrepreneurship, I have serious reservations about this program. For one thing, $250k doesn't exactly create a lot of jobs. I could easily see the 'entrepreneurs' who actually benefit from this just being glorified employees of the VCs or of some existing company that is already funded--and the new company really would exist only on paper.

Something also doesn't feel right about how apparently so many Silicon Valley VC's are apparently excited about this idea. American entrepreneurs have been starved for support from the VC/angel community for awhile now--and now the VC's/angels want to bypass the Americans to give money to foreigners who will be easier to control. I'm sure many of these foreign entrepreneurs are genuinely gifted people with a lot of good ideas--but something doesn't smell right about the whole thing to me.

Comments?

"It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014

[billvon 3,120]

>and now the VC's/angels want to bypass the Americans to give money
>to foreigners who will be easier to control.

Well, keep in mind that there are eight times as many people in China and India as there are in the US, so all things being equal there should be eight times the ideas out there than there are here.

But as a wider question - why the $250K? I think if someone wants to come here to start a company, let them. Even if 90% of them fail.

[SivaGanesha 2]

Quote

But as a wider question - why the $250K?...

Because, IMHO, a lot of these people are just going to end up as glorified employees. It's a 2-year visa. $250K sounds suspiciously like the approximate amount it would cost to hire someone for 2 years (remembering that there are other costs besides salary involved in hiring someone).

"It's hard to have fun at 4-way unless your whole team gets down to the ground safely to do it again!"--Northern California Skydiving League re USPA Safety Day, March 8, 2014