Adam Bonnifield has hired several overseas developers to work on coding projects for his young technology company, but none have been as talented as Marek Publicewicz.
Bonnifield, co-founder of District-based Spinnakr, which offers tools to help firms collect and analyze web traffic data, found Publicewicz, a computer programmer in Poland, six months ago through an online freelancing marketplace called Elance. Spinnakr contracted him to work remotely on a single front-end project, but while tackling that problem, Publicewicz found ways to improve other programs that work behind the scenes, “writing code in such a way to make everyone else’s job easier,” Bonnifield said.
On later projects, when the company expected Publicewicz to give time estimates in days, he would offer estimates measured in hours.
“If he was born here, he would be one of the most sought-after developers in the area, but because he was born in Poland, it’s a different story,” Bonnifield said.
New technology firms often struggle to compete for skilled programmers, particularly in the Washington region, which is brimming with large corporations and government contractors that can offer better benefits and higher salaries. So many start-ups instead search for talent abroad, often hoping to discover someone exceptional who they can eventually bring on staff in the United States.
“It became obvious that we had to get him a visa and get him on our team, and not being familiar with the system, I thought it would be as easy as calling up a lawyer, filing some paperwork, going through a short process and he would be here within about a month,” Bonnifield said in an interview. “But that’s where the problems began.”
Spinnakr’s executives mulled a number of immigration alternatives before deciding to apply for an employer-sponsored H-1B visa for Publicewicz, which cost roughly $2,000 in processing fees on top of the $2,000 they spent on related legal counseling. However, the application won’t be reviewed until April, as the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services only processes H1-B requests during one six-month period each year, and if it’s approved, the earliest the visa would take effect is October.
“I understand that reviews take time, but the current system just doesn’t work for early-stage tech companies,” he said, noting that rounds of angel or venture funding typically provide enough capital for less than a year of start-up operations. “Things happen quickly, so you may be applying for a visa for someone without knowing whether you’ll even have a company still going on the other end, let alone what your needs will be at that point if you are still running.”
Bonnifield is among a growing number of founders and investors who believe policy makers must take steps to attract more highly-skilled and entrepreneurial foreigners to the United States and expedite the application process. Members of Congress from both parties have floated several targeted proposals to tackle both problems, but the measures face a tough road, at least on their own, as the administration and many lawmakers have committed to tackling immigration reform in a comprehensive, not piecemeal, manner.
