Elinor Mills over at CNET asked that question yesterday and the comments have been flying in.
The window for U.S. companies to submit their H-1B visa applications for next year opens today and ends on Monday. And Google's not very happy about the details. Neither are Microsoft and other tech companies. They want the government to increase the number of visas that companies can get to hire foreign workers. More than 150,000 applications are expected to be submitted this year, more than double the annual limit of 65,000.
Most large technology companies point to hundreds of job listings that they can't fill because of the lack of qualified U.S .candidates, they say. In the long run, if they can't hire enough skilled workers here, development and engineering offices are more likely to open elsewhere: H-1B concerns already prompted Microsoft to open a new programming center in Vancouver.
Boris Mann of Bootup Labs covered Bill Gates' thoughts on this topic three weeks ago and hinted at the fact that the Vancouver Development Center might be a temporary refuge for new Microsoft employees and serve as a stepping stone to Redmond. According to a comment from an anonymous Microsoft employee on Mann's post, it looks like that's not the case but only time will tell.
Uh, so I'd really be interested to know what, if anything the technology leadership of BC is doing to capture this opportunity. Is it time to start a "come to Canada" campaign at the grassroots?
This sounds like a good thing for Vancouver, if only as a "temporary refuge" for corporate personnel waiting to transfer to the USA.
Canada seems to be living in the shadows of the metropolitan hubs both on the West and East Coast. This isn't a bad thing, as it's better to have some commerce rather than no commerce at all given that Canada's talent pool is (roughly) 10 times smaller than America's.
I wonder if, over time, Canada's immigration policies will be relaxed or tightened in response to tech organizations using Vancouver, Niagara or Detroit (as border cities) as semi-permanent clearing houses.
[...] Will H-1B caps force the next Google to open in Vancouver? [...]
@Brendon: so, uh, who/what do you define as the technology leadership of BC? Is there an organization or entity or gov't department?
So, short answer, no, there isn't anything being done, at least not on any level that the people in the technology industry know about...
@Boris: Actually, it's kind of a trick question. While most people would be inclined to say "the government" or some sub-branch thereof, I would actually say it's *our* responsibility to spread the word.
Is this maybe something we can make happen form below, perhaps through the BCTIA or any of those other industry organizations?
Yeah, too bad MSFT closed their Vancouver office around '92 or so. I remember having a friend who worked there then and they closed it shortly thereafter. They used to develop MSFT Mail in the pre-Outlook/Exchange days there. Heck, it was nearly the pre-TCP/IP days. Anyway, it's all hollow talk from Gates. he could open a Vancouver office any time. They already have a big dev operation in Montreal. What they really want is more H1-B visas. Talk of offices is just posturing.
[...] office to import international talent that was previously limited by the United States’ restrictive immigration policies. To be clear, this new facility isn’t just another satellite office of the Redmond behemoth; [...]
