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I wonder why entrepreneurs don't come to Poland to build their product. Warsaw or Wroclaw in particular are vibrant, tech-oriented cities where life is about 1

I wonder why entrepreneurs don't come to Poland to build their product. Warsaw or Wroclaw in particular are vibrant, tech-oriented cities where life is about 1/4 of SF. If I had to bet my future on being able to building something with 1M, I would want to get 4 months instead of 1 for the money. Of course, SF might have better investing ecosystem, but once you got the money development should be done in a more appropriate place to buy yourself more time.

bovermyer 8y ago
How's the internet/infrastructure in Poland?
- king_magic 8y ago
  I'd say very good. Talent very good as well. Have worked for a bunch of years with a team in Krakow, great people.
HillaryBriss 8y ago
> buy yourself more time but, does that extra time result in success? I mean, if it takes 4 times as long, then doing a better job of building a higher quality product is probably a losing strategy.
cranklin 8y ago
1M -> 4 months? o_O
Toine 8y ago
Networking.
- navigatesol 8y ago
  >Networking Yeah, in SV you can hook up with all the USC and Stanford kids who bribed their way into college!
  - toephu2 8y ago
    That's only a very small percentage of the population that actually graduated from those schools.
sl1ck731 8y ago
Probably because if they are going to move its easier to just move to one of the other areas of the US. I'd assume cross-Atlantic movement would be after all options in the US, then NA were exhausted of which there are plenty and many up-and-coming areas.
everdev 8y ago
Timezones can be tricky if you need to interface with US stake holders or customers.
qaq 8y ago
tech is one thing but sales is key
donretag 8y ago
Venture capitalists need to be close to the CEO, who in turns needs to be close to the initial team. The Bay Area is popular because that is where the VCs are.
- driverdan 8y ago
  They don't need to, they want to. There's really no need for it.
beat 8y ago
They're probably leaving for home, or for other cities where they have connections. The idea of an entrepreneur taking off from the hottest startup climate in the world to another country, where they don't speak the language, may not have direct access to their target customers, etc... it's just not viable. I'd love to see a startup culture of note form in places like Warsaw, but it's unrealistic to expect cost of living alone to bring brand-new startups there.
- njepa 8y ago
  More specifically you need to be unique to gather critical mass. It doesn't just help being cheap, you have to cheap and something else that puts you a head of a lot of other similar places that are also cheap. And it has to be different enough that it is worth the extra effort. It can't just be, say, relatively easy to for example find an apartment, it has to be significantly easier so that it is an actual advantage. There have been a bunch of Swedes moving to Berlin the last 10 years, with SoundCloud being the most prominent example.
mrkstu 8y ago
The initial seed for a startup culture must be locally derived first. Looking at places like Austin and Utah (Silicon Slopes), the local scene developed first- now more outside money is coming now that the 'existence proof' that it can be done well in these places has been established. I think the necessary (but not completely sufficient) ingredients are lots of young CS grads who would like to stick in the area and a strong local entrepreneurial business culture. That will eventually create the base for successful startups and hopefully get a couple unicornish companies to blaze the trail.
q3k 8y ago
Political climate, for one thing. (recent anti-LGBT sentiment, anti-refugee/migrant sentiment, anti-EU sentiment and general right/nationalist movement uptick)
- badpun 8y ago
  Racism is arguably strong in the US and yet founders are not leaving... I don’t think political climate is on average a strong factor in their decision making.
  - nkkollaw 8y ago
    Ehm... There is no more racism in Poland than in any other country. OP is Pole (from his profile), and some Poles who left the country are bitter about their own country and campaign against it.
    - badpun 8y ago
      I’m a Pole as well. These people you talk about are probably a textbook example of a vocal minority.
      - nkkollaw 8y ago
        Sure, but he's one of them :-)
- nkkollaw 8y ago
  > Political climate, for one thing. (recent anti-LGBT sentiment, anti-refugee/migrant sentiment, anti-EU sentiment and general right/nationalist movement uptick) Did you post this to start a flamewar, because you love campaigning against your own country, or just to spread misinformation? This comment should be flagged.
  - llukas 8y ago
    GP comment can be backed up with news reports and with quotes of MP/government members. What do you need more? > because you love campaigning against your own country Democracy works best when discussion is open.
buryat 8y ago
- laws - capital - language - networking - talent pool - weather&climate
d136o 8y ago
What are the long term prospects for freedom of expression there? [1] As a first generation immigrant I just don't think the opportunities for socio-economic mobility would be present for my (future) kids anywhere but in a liberal democracy. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/10/poland-polarization/568324/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/10/poland-...
- badpun 8y ago
  Most statements in this piece are highly debatable or blown out of proportions. Poland gets a lot of bad press under the new government (which sucks IMO, but on the grounds of their mundane incompetence and stupidity - high even for modern democracies - and not because they’re some evil authoritarians) in part because Polish media is mostly controlled by anti-government journalists, who put very heavy spin on reality. And these are the people who the foreign journalists (Spiegel, NYT, Guardian etc) talk to about situation in Poland. IMO, we’re ruled by cynical simpletons, but probably no greater than Trump, Berlusconi, Cameron etc.
- nkkollaw 8y ago
  The Atlantic seems to be reputable, but extremely biased towards left-wing causes. Left-wing causes include smearing Poland because of its supposedly right-wing government (some Poles don't agree it's right-wing, actually).
scarmig 8y ago
I know the reason I'd be scared to go is Poland's relatively high levels of politicized homophobia. There was this, as recently as checks notes earlier today. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-poland-lgbt/polands-ruling-party-picks-lgbt-rights-as-election-battlefront-idUSKCN1QW0T7 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-poland-lgbt/polands-rulin...
- nkkollaw 8y ago
  Why are you obsessed with that? There are gays everywhere that live normal lives, here, just like in any other European country. As for your link: what are LGBT rights? It's unconstitutional to treat any citizen differently than the next in any western country, so there is nothing to whine about. LGBT rights are LGBT privileges, and Poland has rightfully decided to not let PC trump common sense. Sorry!
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
nathan_f77 8y ago
> I wonder why entrepreneurs don't come to Poland to build their product. The answer is that immigration is very difficult. I couldn't find any freelancer or entrepreneur visas for Poland, so it looks like it would be impossible for me to relocate there and work on my own startup. I'm making it even more difficult for myself, because I would prefer to build a small sustainable business where I don't take any traditional investment or go through an accelerator. I also want to have a fully remote team, so I have no need for a physical office or local employees. Thailand seems to be the best option for now, and it's not through any government program. I'm actually employed by an agency called Iglu [1], so I have a business visa and work permit. However, I don't have a boss, and I find all of my own freelancing contracts. My startup also hires Iglu for development services, even though I'm the sole developer, so I am technically working for Iglu while building my own product. I think it's a really great setup, and it makes everything very easy, stable, and legal. But I would really like to find some similar opportunities in other countries. [1] https://iglu.net https://iglu.net
- nkkollaw 8y ago
  You don't need to have a visa to start a company. I started one and it takes 5 minutes from a government website. After that you can stay anywhere in Europe for 6mo./year without a visa, which includes Poland.

bovermyer 8y ago

How's the internet/infrastructure in Poland?

king_magic 8y ago
I'd say very good. Talent very good as well. Have worked for a bunch of years with a team in Krakow, great people.

HillaryBriss 8y ago

> buy yourself more time but, does that extra time result in success? I mean, if it takes 4 times as long, then doing a better job of building a higher quality product is probably a losing strategy.

cranklin 8y ago

1M -> 4 months? o_O

Toine 8y ago

Networking.

navigatesol 8y ago
>Networking Yeah, in SV you can hook up with all the USC and Stanford kids who bribed their way into college!
- toephu2 8y ago
  That's only a very small percentage of the population that actually graduated from those schools.

sl1ck731 8y ago

Probably because if they are going to move its easier to just move to one of the other areas of the US. I'd assume cross-Atlantic movement would be after all options in the US, then NA were exhausted of which there are plenty and many up-and-coming areas.

everdev 8y ago

Timezones can be tricky if you need to interface with US stake holders or customers.

qaq 8y ago

tech is one thing but sales is key

donretag 8y ago

Venture capitalists need to be close to the CEO, who in turns needs to be close to the initial team. The Bay Area is popular because that is where the VCs are.

driverdan 8y ago
They don't need to, they want to. There's really no need for it.

beat 8y ago

They're probably leaving for home, or for other cities where they have connections. The idea of an entrepreneur taking off from the hottest startup climate in the world to another country, where they don't speak the language, may not have direct access to their target customers, etc... it's just not viable. I'd love to see a startup culture of note form in places like Warsaw, but it's unrealistic to expect cost of living alone to bring brand-new startups there.

njepa 8y ago
More specifically you need to be unique to gather critical mass. It doesn't just help being cheap, you have to cheap and something else that puts you a head of a lot of other similar places that are also cheap. And it has to be different enough that it is worth the extra effort. It can't just be, say, relatively easy to for example find an apartment, it has to be significantly easier so that it is an actual advantage. There have been a bunch of Swedes moving to Berlin the last 10 years, with SoundCloud being the most prominent example.

mrkstu 8y ago

The initial seed for a startup culture must be locally derived first. Looking at places like Austin and Utah (Silicon Slopes), the local scene developed first- now more outside money is coming now that the 'existence proof' that it can be done well in these places has been established. I think the necessary (but not completely sufficient) ingredients are lots of young CS grads who would like to stick in the area and a strong local entrepreneurial business culture. That will eventually create the base for successful startups and hopefully get a couple unicornish companies to blaze the trail.

q3k 8y ago

Political climate, for one thing. (recent anti-LGBT sentiment, anti-refugee/migrant sentiment, anti-EU sentiment and general right/nationalist movement uptick)

badpun 8y ago
Racism is arguably strong in the US and yet founders are not leaving... I don’t think political climate is on average a strong factor in their decision making.
- nkkollaw 8y ago
  Ehm... There is no more racism in Poland than in any other country. OP is Pole (from his profile), and some Poles who left the country are bitter about their own country and campaign against it.
  - badpun 8y ago
    I’m a Pole as well. These people you talk about are probably a textbook example of a vocal minority.
    - nkkollaw 8y ago
      Sure, but he's one of them :-)
nkkollaw 8y ago
> Political climate, for one thing. (recent anti-LGBT sentiment, anti-refugee/migrant sentiment, anti-EU sentiment and general right/nationalist movement uptick) Did you post this to start a flamewar, because you love campaigning against your own country, or just to spread misinformation? This comment should be flagged.
- llukas 8y ago
  GP comment can be backed up with news reports and with quotes of MP/government members. What do you need more? > because you love campaigning against your own country Democracy works best when discussion is open.

buryat 8y ago

- laws - capital - language - networking - talent pool - weather&climate

d136o 8y ago

What are the long term prospects for freedom of expression there? [1] As a first generation immigrant I just don't think the opportunities for socio-economic mobility would be present for my (future) kids anywhere but in a liberal democracy. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/10/poland-polarization/568324/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/10/poland-...

badpun 8y ago
Most statements in this piece are highly debatable or blown out of proportions. Poland gets a lot of bad press under the new government (which sucks IMO, but on the grounds of their mundane incompetence and stupidity - high even for modern democracies - and not because they’re some evil authoritarians) in part because Polish media is mostly controlled by anti-government journalists, who put very heavy spin on reality. And these are the people who the foreign journalists (Spiegel, NYT, Guardian etc) talk to about situation in Poland. IMO, we’re ruled by cynical simpletons, but probably no greater than Trump, Berlusconi, Cameron etc.
nkkollaw 8y ago
The Atlantic seems to be reputable, but extremely biased towards left-wing causes. Left-wing causes include smearing Poland because of its supposedly right-wing government (some Poles don't agree it's right-wing, actually).

scarmig 8y ago

I know the reason I'd be scared to go is Poland's relatively high levels of politicized homophobia. There was this, as recently as checks notes earlier today. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-poland-lgbt/polands-ruling-party-picks-lgbt-rights-as-election-battlefront-idUSKCN1QW0T7 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-poland-lgbt/polands-rulin...

nkkollaw 8y ago
Why are you obsessed with that? There are gays everywhere that live normal lives, here, just like in any other European country. As for your link: what are LGBT rights? It's unconstitutional to treat any citizen differently than the next in any western country, so there is nothing to whine about. LGBT rights are LGBT privileges, and Poland has rightfully decided to not let PC trump common sense. Sorry!

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

nathan_f77 8y ago

> I wonder why entrepreneurs don't come to Poland to build their product. The answer is that immigration is very difficult. I couldn't find any freelancer or entrepreneur visas for Poland, so it looks like it would be impossible for me to relocate there and work on my own startup. I'm making it even more difficult for myself, because I would prefer to build a small sustainable business where I don't take any traditional investment or go through an accelerator. I also want to have a fully remote team, so I have no need for a physical office or local employees. Thailand seems to be the best option for now, and it's not through any government program. I'm actually employed by an agency called Iglu [1], so I have a business visa and work permit. However, I don't have a boss, and I find all of my own freelancing contracts. My startup also hires Iglu for development services, even though I'm the sole developer, so I am technically working for Iglu while building my own product. I think it's a really great setup, and it makes everything very easy, stable, and legal. But I would really like to find some similar opportunities in other countries. [1] https://iglu.net https://iglu.net

nkkollaw 8y ago
You don't need to have a visa to start a company. I started one and it takes 5 minutes from a government website. After that you can stay anywhere in Europe for 6mo./year without a visa, which includes Poland.