
B12 Bishkek: How we extended our team in Central Asia - marcua
https://blog.b12.io/b12-bishkek-how-we-built-a-home-in-central-asia-b482d85cf919
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dforrestwilson
Have spent a small amount of time there...Kyrgyzstan is truly beautiful and
the people are great!

No mention of the political risks though?

[https://www.economist.com/asia/2017/10/21/kyrgyzstan-
holds-a...](https://www.economist.com/asia/2017/10/21/kyrgyzstan-holds-an-
election-that-was-not-a-foregone-
conclusion?zid=307&ah=5e80419d1bc9821ebe173f4f0f060a07)

Even factoring that risk in, getting great talent so cheap seems like a win.

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fyfy18
> No mention of the political risks though?

Do they really need to be mentioned? For most people, i.e. those who aren't
getting involved with the country's politics and won't be seen by the
government/regime as a threat, it's not going to even remotely be an issue.

It's like saying that I, as a non-American citizen, should be concerned if I
ever want to start a blogging startup based in New York.

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gotts
>For most people, i.e. those who aren't getting involved with the country's
politics

The moment 1/3 of your neighborhood in "downtown" area is heavily looted and
internet is turned off completely(2005) or unidentified groups of people with
AK shooting near your house(2010) is when _you are involved_ despite your
desire.

dforrestwilson made a great point about instability risks.

PS speaking from personal experience. I no longer live there

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pm90
I really like this story. One thing I've noticed is that if you can find a
great engineer from another country and they help you recruit good locals,
that turns out to be the most effective kind of offshoring experience.

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joemclo
There's quite of bit of interesting startup stuff going on in Bishkek, given
it's size.

[https://maddevs.io/en](https://maddevs.io/en) is quite a cool development
consultancy based there, which has been involved in development of namba taxi,
an uber type app.

namba itself has a whole host of projects similar to the more well known
startups in Europe, e.g. Namba taxi, Namba food, and a video streaming
service.

ololo (which was referenced in the piece) is a lovely community of different
startups, and art projects fostering an entrepreneurial spirit.

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job_steves
What's it like to get a temporary work Visa for Kyrgyzstan for Canadians?
Seems like a fun place to work/intern for a couple months.

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gotts
Just noticed your question. It is fun place indeed! As a Canadian you don't
need Visa for <60 days stay.

Feel free to ask if you have more questions

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lappet
This is very cool. I wonder if Central Asia can work closely with the Indian
startup scene - it is closer physically and culturally as well.

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IWeldMelons
I live in Central Asia. No, culturally we are not close to Indians. We are
close to Turks and Russians, but not Indians. For example we have no
difficulties saying that something cannot be done or we do not know how to do
it.

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combinatorics
Kainar looks like Terry Tao (mathematician).

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baybal2
Once did project working on tourniquettes for rapid transit in Astana for
Beijing Second United Construction Group. Later, we somehow stumbled upon
custom made drone tender for Kazakhstan's border guard (which later was found
out to be just a cover for presidential guard regiment...)

My intention was to try to hire few juniors as assistants, and UI devs. Seemed
trivial at first, but the moment applicants heard of us being a foreign
company, they instantly switched the talk to paid relocation package, hiring
immigration lawyer, and if we can bring them a Chinese passport on a golden
platter... This was the case with like 4 out of 5 applicants.

My advise, keep quiet about you being an overseas company till the last
moment.

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nurgasemetey
So you wanted to take advantage by not informing them?

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sheeshkebab
I think he is saying it’s not a no brainer or cost effective setting up remote
teams in these areas as some stories make it out to be.

