Those guys aren't brought here on a H-1B visa though, atleast that wasn't the case at msft. They come in on 'L1's i think. L1 allows a company to shuttle employ

Those guys aren't brought here on a H-1B visa though, atleast that wasn't the case at msft. They come in on 'L1's i think. L1 allows a company to shuttle employees within their branches. They aren't allowed to work anywhere else though. MSFT outsourced ops/rote testing stuff to an Indian consulting company, Infosys/Wipro, don't remember which. Those companies in-turn have branches here and they bring in these guys from India. They come-in for periods of 3-4 months and go back once the project is done. Although, considering the fact that all these Indian outsourcing companies are morally, ethically corrupt and run by scumbags, I wouldn't be surprised if they were pulling some fraudulent scam. I totally agree with you, I don't think Apple/MS et al have significant cost savings when they pull this shit. They can easily find someone here without making a dent in their pockets. And like you point out, they're actually probably paying more to these guys. My guess is there's some MBA in the finance/HR division pulling this shit..the 'consulting experts' from OfficeSpace come to mind. Being Indian, I know the quality of idiots these outsourcing companies hire. Most of them can't code their way out of a paper bag. And worse, they bring a bad reputation to Indian engineers in general. I got my masters here in the US and there were scores of reasonably component people in my undergrad class I TA'ed who'd be more than happy to fill up QA and data entry jobs at these companies. These Indian outsourcing companies should be banned from bringing people here period.