

New visa will boost UK high-tech sector - DanielH
http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE6A30WA20101104

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pg
This might at least light a fire under the US government to do the same.

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brlewis
I hope that happens, but I haven't noticed the US government being quick to
imitate good ideas from other countries.

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pg
I agree they rarely imitate good ideas, but they respond to competition. So if
we could point to startups that happened in other countries as a result of US
visa policies, that would apply pressure.

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csomar
_The proposed new "entrepreneur visa" would allow people with great business
ideas and the backing of serious investors to set up shop more easily in
Britain._

The most important part. How much of funding to make it a serious investor?

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ig1
Current requirements for entrepreneur visa:

    
    
      • You have access to not less than £200,000 
      • The money is held in one or more regulated financial institutions 
      • The money is disposable in the United Kingdom
      • You personally have at least £3000 to support yourself
      • You can pass an english language fluency test
    

For more details:
[http://www.ukvisas.gov.uk/en/howtoapply/infs/inf24pbsentrepr...](http://www.ukvisas.gov.uk/en/howtoapply/infs/inf24pbsentrepreneur)

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jbarham
Even w/ this visa London will be no more attractive as a startup hub than New
York, both of which are dominated by over-paid financiers who have driven up
the cost of living to unaffordable levels for normal folks, let alone boot-
strapping entrepreneurs. And then there's the weather...

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ced
If you're from the US, maybe. But if you're from Bangladesh and looking for a
place to do a startup, you may decide to go to London for the visa.

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maxklein
Unless they also do something about the weather, I'd still pick California.

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nhebb
I thought you were going to China: <http://maxkle.in/giving-up-on-europe/>

BTW, I don't mean this as a snarky retort. I'm seriously curious whether that
plan has panned out for you.

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maxklein
I did go.

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swombat
And..?

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jot
More detail on this over at TechCrunch Europe:
[http://eu.techcrunch.com/2010/11/04/uk-government-plans-
east...](http://eu.techcrunch.com/2010/11/04/uk-government-plans-east-london-
tech-cluster-startup-visa-review-of-ip-law-200-million-in-finance-what/)

Thread here: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1867017>

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ivenkys
A definite plus move and the canny thing is locating it near the existing
"Tech Triangle" - Shoreditch and moving Eastwards towards Stratford.

That part of London is cheap, well connected and has a large immigrant
population. It will be interesting to see how this pans out in reality , but
all the good signs are there.

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goatforce5
Shoreditch is anything but cheap. It'll fall off pretty quick by the time you
get to Stratford though.

I lived in Tower Hamlets (ie, the area in question) for 10 years and loved it.
A lot of native Londoners look down on it as it has a reputation and is kinda
rough around the edges. I understand a lot has changed in the last few years
with the financial collapse and them dumping money in to the area in the build
up to the Olympics.

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sinzone
you should add "UK" in the title.

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illumen
There's been a visa like this for some years already in the UK. I guess he is
just changing it, and taking credit.

Basically if you have a whole bunch of money available you can set up a
business in the uk. You must hire a certain amount of people over a certain
amount of years.

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yardie
The same visa also exists in the US. Have $500k-1 million? Then you can get in
the short line to get a greencard.

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bilban
Can someone explain the what Cameron means by altering the intellectual
property laws?

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zray
I thought it might be software patents from the Reuters article but Techcrunch
suggests its more about a DMCA-like system

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tyng
Surprise the UK made the move before US given all the hype about #startupvisa
a few months ago.

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sinzone
UK make the move, US make the "words"

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known
agriculture: 1.2% industry: 23.8% services: 75% (2009 est.)

Isn't services sector saturated?

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swombat
No, this is symptomatic of a modern economy. Any advanced economy will have a
similar focus.

If you think about it on a higher level, it makes a lot of sense. At first,
the great bottleneck was having enough food, so all economies began with an
almost-100% focus on agriculture. But then, as that became less and less of a
problem, the next bottleneck was having enough stuff - whether machinery to
make agriculture more efficient, or other items to make your life better.

As "stuff" gets less and less scarce, and cheaper and cheaper to acquire, what
are we left with? The final bottleneck, which isn't going away any time soon,
is that we all only have 24 hours in a day. "Services" is a euphemism for
"ways to buy other people's time so you can have more than 24 hours of 'good
time' (and higher 'good time' than you'd be able to achieve by yourself) per
day". Whether that's bank services to speed up your money handling, or
cleaning services, or web design services, or any other number of services
which basically amount to helping someone, somewhere to make more efficient
use of their time.

This is the final bottleneck until we figure out how to speed up our thoughts,
and so all activity ends up piling into there.

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netcan
Another thing I wonder about is this:

Company X makes white computers. It has all sorts of employees: hardware
designers, software developers, industrial engineers, factory workers,
janitors, even gym instructors and aroma therapists. Over time the company
evolves or is replaced. The new company mostly manufactures. A lot of the
engineering is done by other companies. The hire janitorial service companies
and employees can get their own damn aroma therapists.

The second situation is contributing percentage points to the "service," but
fundamentally nothing has really changed. Same people doing the same jobs for
the same purpose, just structured differently.

