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Ask HN: Anyone moving their company out of the UK following Brexit?

• dijit 10y ago
  The Financial hub in Frankfurt will likely attract the more serious and large businesses in the banking industry. As for myself, personally, I was already abroad when the ship sank so all I have to do is not return. Come to Sweden my fellow expatriots! lots of tech!
  • Roritharr 10y ago
    I'm very active in Frankfurt and the attention we've been getting for the past few weeks is insane. Frankfurt as a FinTech Hub is already being shouted from the rooftops here, but with Brexit it seems that Investors start to actually believe that in droves. Crazy Times for me.
    • tacon 10y ago
      I heard a news report about Frankfurt being smaller than Charlotte, North Carolina, so it can't possibly absorb all of London's financial companies anytime soon. It was certainly a lesson in geography, as I'd always thought of Frankfurt as a larger city.
      • vidarh 10y ago
        Londons financial area is basically City ("the square mile") and Docklands - two tiny little parts of town, so if you're going to go by size it's meaningless to compare all of London.
      • Roritharr 10y ago
        You are absolutely right, peoples perception of Frankfurt is mostly wrong. But the size of Frankfurt largely contributes to the quality of life here. You can very easily traverse the city by bike, the public transportation is fast and quick, and the big banks attract lots of capital. By day Frankfurt grows to about 1.5 Million people who just come to the city to work here, so it feels much bigger while still having everything happen on a rather small scale. The biggest downside would probably be that Frankfurt is at the top of nothing. We have very good theatres, very good restaurants, nice outdoor activities, but compared to other cities, you don't come here for any specific thing, you come here for the sum of things that make it a very attractive city to live in. The airport is reachable very fast from the city center, i was able to traverse between a Frankfurt Office and a London Office in about 1:20 door to door, so its geographical location makes it also very attractive when visiting or working somewhere else on the continent. As local novelties DECIX is located here and many large Data Centers have popped up all over the area, so if you are interested in Infrastructure there's a lot of jobs and know how in the city.
        • kaybe 10y ago
          Frankfurt is very much embedded in its surroundings, with many smaller interconnected towns and several mid-sized cities within reach. [1] This gives access to up to 5.5 million people, 2.2 million in Frankfurt's close vicinity. Many of those happily change city for work, especially since the distances are quite short. Traffic is usually a worse problem for travel time than distance. You also have the somewhat unfair situation of smaller towns right next to Frankfurt offering lower corporate taxes (part of which is levied by the cities) while taking advantage of Frankfurt's infrastructure (which is also paid with the corporate taxes paid in Frankfurt). This attracts a lot of businesses, of course, and on paper detracts from Frankfurt's size when all that separates them is one Autobahn. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankfurt_Rhine-Main https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankfurt_Rhine-Main
  • jcoward 10y ago
    If you don't mind I have a few questions about working in tech in Sweden: - How easy have you found finding tech jobs in Sweden, do you have any advice for good places to look? - How does the pay compare to other countries/cities you've worked in? - Do you speak Swedish at work/is it possible to get by without being fluent in Swedish?
    • edutechnion 10y ago
      The most important question: how do I find an apartment to rent in Stockholm city center without Swedish connections and without spending more than 1/3 net pay?
      • elliotec 10y ago
        Easy answer: you don't.
      • dijit 10y ago
        Stockholm is the worst place to go in Sweden in terms of cost of living, and yes, it's impossible to get an apartment there. Luckily the tech scene is very spread out, Lulea, Gothenburg and Lund all have a variety of tech.
      • robotresearcher 10y ago
        It's the same all over. In what capital city of a major democracy are there jobs and affordable apartments? I initially meant that rhetorically, but now I'm actually interested to know. Maybe there are good non-govt jobs and low prices in smaller capital cities like Ottawa (<0.8M) and Canberra (<0.4M)? Educate me!
    • dijit 10y ago
      > - How easy have you found finding tech jobs in Sweden, do you have any advice for good places to look? There are a few good places just north of Malmo, in Lund (which is an exceptionally nice place to live), but there are also good places for IT in Lulea (where google and facebook operate), and Gothenburg. It's very spread out. The only one I don't recommend it stockholm, the wages are higher but you pay more outgoing in rent by a wide margin, and "first hand" apartments are basically impossible to get there. > - How does the pay compare to other countries/cities you've worked in? I used to live/work in Helsinki and London, now I work in Malmo. I'm working in a sector with historically low wages and I earn about 30% less than I did in London. But that is almost perfectly in line with cost of living. Other sectors pay much better. I would be better off here than London if I chose something other than video games as an industry. Helsinki was very comparable to London in terms of salary/cost of living. > - Do you speak Swedish at work/is it possible to get by without being fluent in Swedish? I don't speak Swedish at all, the only issue is my banking which is all done in Swedish.
• SEJeff 10y ago
  Consider Berlin, besides being very cheap, it is a great place for startups. It also happens to be easy as everyone speaks English.
  • ido 10y ago
    Might be 'cheap' compared to London but Berlin has seen considerable year-on-year price increase every year for the past 5-10 years. Real estate here has probably never seen such high & sustained price increases in modern (post WW2) history- in many desirable neighborhoods prices have increased by 10%+ YoY every year for a decade, which was previously unheard of (Germany has traditionally had a very stable real estate).
    • spriggan3 10y ago
      That's a phenomenon that happens in every big city in Western Europe unfortunately. At least the cost of living besides rent is still cheap in Berlin, unlike cities in northern Europe.
      • wtvanhest 10y ago
        It is happening in almost every major US city as well. Boston, SF, NYC, DC, even downtown Orlando. Millennials are trading in the suburbs for cities.
    • SEJeff 10y ago
      Care to recommend somewhere better? I'm a US based person, but travel to Berlin fairly often and have interacted with several tech friends there in the local scene. It is a surprisingly vibrant and friendly community. Coworking also seems to be a really big thing there. So, price aside, it is still cheaper than any major US city (especially with the current USD <--> EUR exchange rate), London, and anything else I personally am aware of.
      • ido 10y ago
        I would still recommend it, just not expect it to be crazy cheap like it once was. The big eastern eu cities should generally still be cheaper and some of them are pretty nice (e.g. Prague). I hear east Asia is much cheaper still.
• jasonvorhe 10y ago
  How about Amsterdam?
  • radicalbyte 10y ago
    It's like Germany, only everyone speaks English, not the < 40 :)
  • jypepin 10y ago
    Yes I just moved to Amsterdam (after 4 years in SF, 10 years in Montreal, and growing up in Paris before that) and it all seems way better than expected so far. Everyone speaks english, most services also offer communications in english (bank, etc.) so really I don't find myself stuck trying to translate Dutch all the time (until I learn it) and tech seems to grow a lot here. While working in the city, I can see a lot of local tech and SV tech (Uber, booking, Atlassian, etc.). It's also super cheap overall, and most foreign skill workers get 30% of their salary tax free. As to move your company, I quickly looked and it seems like the taxes for companies in Amsterdam is easy and nice. 20% on the first 200k, 25% for the rest. And apparently lots of things deducible.
    • toomuchtodo 10y ago
      Isn't the cost of rent fairly high though?
      • jypepin 10y ago
        well, coming from SF, rent is about 60% cheaper. We are able to afford a 2beds 2baths apt well located for what seems reasonable.
    • fennecfoxen 10y ago
      > I don't find myself stuck trying to translate Dutch all the time Dutch is close enough to English that you can eyeball it for a lot of things with just a little basic work: e.g. in the subways where "houd uw kaart op de lezer" (iirc) is "hold your card on the reader" Further examples with just a bit more context: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOueN0sV2SY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOueN0sV2SY
• gravypod 10y ago
  I know this might sound ignorant but can you not stay in the UK and just trade with the EU? I mean I buy stuff from European countries and I'm in the US. Why can't you?
  • teh 10y ago
    I'm the 2nd part of this. We're not making any rash decisions and staying is one option. It's not just brexit: We have an end-to-end encryption product and we're really super unclear on what the new IP bill means. It looks invasive and we're not keen on waiting to find out.
  • anon1385 10y ago
    There's a greater than zero chance that EU residents will lose the right to legally reside in the UK. The new PM has threatened it, and when she was called out her response was "What you want to let criminals stay in the country?!". So yeah…
    • ddebernardy 10y ago
      Yeah, but she's just posing and is not credible in this respect. It's a bit like hitting the nuclear self-destruct button or something. Germany and France are making it quite clear that access to the common market includes reasonably free movement of people, compliance with EU law, paying into the pot, and sorting out the situation of UK residents in the EU (also a problem) and EU residents in the UK. Methinks the chance that EU residents will lose the right to legally reside in the UK is close to nil - at the very least those that are there already. What will more likely happen is that the UK will get a deal a bit like Norway or Switzerland where they basically apply EU laws and without having a say on what they are, and business as usual will resume in the name of keeping the City intact - with UK voters more disgruntled than ever.
      • jonknee 10y ago
        > Germany and France are making it quite clear that access to the common market includes reasonably free movement of people, compliance with EU law, paying into the pot, and sorting out the situation of UK residents in the EU (also a problem) and EU residents in the UK. That's all well and good, but all of those things are what people were voting to get rid of with a Brexit vote. It will be a tough sell.
• deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
• squeral 10y ago
  What about Lisbon? Portugal is very, very cheap compared to London and Berlin.
• simonswords82 10y ago
  No
• ihaveajob 10y ago
  I'm going to go ahead and throw in Granada, Spain as a lovely place for tech startups. Good university, livable college town, cheap cost of living, and not a lot of competition for talent.
  • toomuchtodo 10y ago
    What are rents like for a flat in Granada?
    • heelhook 10y ago
      fwiw I'm paying 650 euros per month for a two stories, three bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, community pool/paddle courts + garage. There are tons of cheaper things though; a friend mentioned someone's renting a cave (yes, a cave) for 150 euros in [Sacromonte][0]. Caves are supposed to be pretty nice and special places from what I've heard. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacromonte https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacromonte
  • heelhook 10y ago
    Are you from/living in granada by any chance? I just moved to Granada and would love to know more about the local tech/entrepreneurial scene.
    • ihaveajob 10y ago
      I'm from Granada, but I moved to California 15 years ago. I keep in touch with friends, some of them have their own company (http://www.celtiberian.es/ http://www.celtiberian.es/). Ask away if you have any questions. :)
• vasco 10y ago
  In Malta you also get to do everything in English and foreigners with companies have nice tax breaks.
  • disgruntledphd2 10y ago
    The internet is terrible though. Everything else is pretty good.
• nickpsecurity 10y ago
  I'm curious what Europeans think about that howtostayin.eu link? Someone sent it to me this morning. Reminds me of the old Perpetual Traveler and offshore schemes except this time for an unexpected goal haha.
• lefstathiou 10y ago
  For clarification, is anyone on this thread in the process or committed to moving their company out of the U.K.? Realize there is plenty to speculate about and there are many great alternatives, curious who is actually doing it.
• sebastianconcpt 10y ago
  Doing the Brexit means wider economic freedom not narrower, isn't it? Then what's the main driver to move out UK after Brexit?
• saosebastiao 10y ago
  The surveillance state is a legitimate fear, but people are seriously overblowing the business threat of Brexit. Trade still exists. It won't be any more difficult to trade with the EU than it currently is to trade with the US. If anything, there are probably some very real long term benefits that can come from this. Smaller governments (Geographic and demographic small, not %-of-GDP small) have some serious benefits in terms of their ability to adapt to the world around them. For example, a floating currency means that your currency can adapt to your conditions, and not your conditions weighted by your economic impact relative to your peers. A floating currency would have benefited both Greece and Germany during their last economic conundrum. Another benefit is that it is much harder to hide corruption as well as nominally-legal forms of corruption like pork-barrel spending. Special interest groups become much more limited in scope. Democracy is more accountable because it is smaller and can command more attention. Think of any reform attempt like you think of refactoring code. Which program can handle simple refactorings better? The 20k LOC program, or the 2m LOC program? I would be willing to bet that most 2m LOC java programs are still stuck on java6, java7 if they're lucky. If the US were more federated than it currently is, we probably would have switched to the metric system sooner. We probably would have overhauled health care sooner (we might have had 50 different types of health care systems, but we would have reformed them in the 80's instead of 2010 and we would have a very clear picture of which reforms worked well and which ones didn't). It will always be easier to get 50m people on board with an idea than it will be to get 500m people on board. In fact, it might even be easier to reform the ridiculous surveillance state that the UK has going. Brexit might have been led by despicable (IMO) rationales, but from a business/economic perspective the negatives are overblown and nobody is talking about the benefits.
  • Keats 10y ago
    Brexit doesn't have that many benefits to non-UK citizens like us though
    • cttet 10y ago
      non-UK EU citizens FTFY
  • 10y ago
• roryisok 10y ago
  Come to Ireland, we'd love to have you! 100% English speaking, culture very similar to UK, but our cities are not franchise laden cookie cutters of one another. Dublin is expensive but Cork, Galway, Sligo, Donegal, pretty much anywhere else is affordable and easy to reach. The people are friendly, the food is good, and there's lots to do.
  • secfirstmd 10y ago
    Can't agree more!
• secfirstmd 10y ago
  Yep, moving www.secfirst.org to Ireland in the next few weeks. Many reasons: -Brexit - London doesn't just seem like the place it once was years ago. The shine has gone from it. -Surveillance - IP bill etc. We build open source technology for human rights defenders. We don't want to be based in a place where people might try to compromise Umbrella etc (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.secfirst.umbrella https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.secfirst.u...) -Talent - most of our team is either Irish or in some way Eastern European. We want to be able to continue to attract and work with people like that. -Eurozone - sterling is just a mess at the moment -Business - Corporate tax in Ireland is low and there is a good small tech sector. Also small but decent grants via www.idaireland.com www.connectireland.com www.enterprise-ireland.com -Personal - Dublin has been (who knows in the next few months) really on the way up for the past year or two. The atmosphere is amazing. It's gotten very cool and tolerant (Gay marriage referendum was very symbolic of that). Also we don't have a far right/left the way that the rest of Europe has. Irish people continue to be awesome to work with and mostly, great fun to be around. If your thinking of Dublin and looking for more info, drop me a mail to the place in my intro... There are inevitably going to be some negative things people will mention about Dublin, as this topic came up before on HN so i've reposted my response here: ----- Some of the negativity doesn't make sense. The piece about not living in the city centre and instead the suburb commuter towns is madness. Totally the opposite. The commuter towns to Dublin are boring as hell, housing estates with very little services. Inner City Dublin is rejuvenating very fast, and parts of it feel like a smaller, more intimate version of Shoreditch or Williamsberg (except with better pubs and bars!). You can basically walk across most of the city within 45 mins. Transport is poor compared to European standards and the cost of living is quite high. But if you live close to the city in Dublin it's not bad and it's a great place to socialise and be within 45 minutes of nature. It's probably one of the few capital cities in world where it's not unusual to strike up a conversation with a random person beside you on a bus. Also it's a pretty easy place to do business. Our nature is humourously sarcastic and not liking authority which means we are pretty good problems solvers and management tends to be quite flat. The software is also small, so your only ever really a phonecall away from having a pint with whoever you need to speak to in the whole sector - from a graduate you met at a conference to a government Minister. People also work to live not live to work (like the US) which makes a big difference. Also a big part of worklife is around interactions with colleagues - it's basically an assumption that most offices are full of at least a few characters who like to have the "craic" and banter. When working abroad I found I really missed those tiny interactions you have on a daily basis in Ireland - e.g someone telling you a story and making you laugh. Even in London you don't get that. It's not something you can pickup by getting an MBA but it makes such a big difference to the quality of life - compared to a stale work environment.
• ajeet_dhaliwal 10y ago
  No one knows what the new arrangement will be yet (including with existing EU migrants) so would you not be better off waiting until you know what is actually going to happen? Unless of course you already have good reason to want to leave.
• groundCode 10y ago
  Personally, I'm basing my startup on the brexit fallout depressing the value of the pound, making outsourcing development to the uk cheaper than ever :) to wit I have set up http://brexitlabs.com http://brexitlabs.com In all seriousness, I don't have a company to move, but I am seriously considering moving. I have a family here so it isn't as simple as pack up and go, but I've emigrated before so....In the meantime, parody seems my best bet. :)
• seikatsu 10y ago
  This question has come up so often in last few weeks that we gathered some reading and tooling to help pragmatic post-Brexit decision making, here: https://teleport.org/brexit https://teleport.org/brexit
  • teh 10y ago
    This is a great resource, thank you!
• ecliptik 10y ago
  Not moving, but it seems some companies are not planning to open offices there anymore, like Rancher, - https://twitter.com/smw355/status/746204644947296257 https://twitter.com/smw355/status/746204644947296257
• cttet 10y ago
  I read the ghost article but they mentioned many times that the country "Must be outside the EU", which is like the Brexit impact is not enough ...
  • Keats 10y ago
    They were mostly complaining about the VAT MOSS, which is very annoying by itself