

The Lure of Chilecon Valley - gphil
http://www.economist.com/node/21564589

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djb_hackernews
I am in Startup Chile as a technical cofounder. I found my team via a post on
hackernews.

I can answer questions, but the one thing that I don't think any other
incubator program has is the diversity and community. Some of us had dinner
last night, and at the table were at least 9 nationalities represented, which
is totally normal in startup chile. And they all have a common passion of
technology, business, and innovation. The program self organizes into topical
groups, and all in the name of information sharing. I truly believe the
success of the program hinges on this network.

Santiago is safe, just like the rest of the country, and the economic
development arm of the govt is very aggressive. I believe they are matching
50% of private funding for economic development, and it is common for startup
chile graduates to get some of this funding if they decide to stay in Chile.
(We were just awarded a grant to help internationalize and promote our
business outside of Chiles borders, for instance)

We met with a large well respected law firm yesterday to look into
incorporating here, and they are also modelling the SV/NYC pro bono/deeply
discounted rates for startups, which is great sign and definitely needed.

Lots of opportunity down here for someone that wants to be part of an amazing
community.

~~~
partisan
Would you recommend the program for someone with a family? Do you see this
much in your group?

~~~
djb_hackernews
My partner is married, and I know of several teams with spouses and children.
Some have come with their entire families, some have not.

It's certainly possible, a bit of an adventure for sure, and I feel like a lot
of people with families live outside of Santiago (even though there are family
friendly suburbs in city limits). You are free to live anywhere in Chile,
including Easter Island. Though living in Santiago makes the monthly paperwork
meetings easier.

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tokenadult
An interesting article about a project discussed from time to time here on
Hacker News. It would be interesting to hear comments from HN participants in
Chile about this paragraph from the article: "Another barrier to creating a
vibrant start-up culture is Chile’s harsh bankruptcy regime, which makes it
hard for those who fail to start afresh. Also, the economy is dominated by a
few vast business empires and an extremely conservative bureaucracy.
Ironically, this is threatening to stifle a peer-to-peer lending business that
Mr Shea, Start-Up Chile’s founding father, recently launched."

~~~
vpeters25
I grew up in Chile and although bankruptcy laws are harsh, labor laws are even
harsher and unlikely to change given the political power of unions:

Employers are mandated to give 30 days notice when laying off employees. They
also have to pay 1 month per each year of employee service. (employee been
there 9 years, you have to pay him monthly salary * 10 to let him go)

This law is good for employee stability and help keeps salaries low (employees
with several years of service are unlikely to quit and lose the accrued
severance). However you cannot show up one morning, close the curtain and tell
everybody "sorry, company ran out of money".

~~~
gyardley
Maybe you can answer this for me, since I've always wondered: what happens if
your company runs out of money, and you get into an impossible situation where
you can't keep paying your employees, but you also can't afford to pay the
severance required by law to lay them off?

Does the government throw you in jail? Does it come out of your own pocket?
(And what if you personally can't afford it?) Does the company just end up
owing everyone a bunch of money it can't pay anyway?

~~~
jpablo
I don't know about Chile, but in Mexico with similar laws the company will go
to something similar to chapter 11. And this money owned to employees will the
considered as part of the company debts (however it'll be the higher priority
debt).

As a debt it can be negotiated (with unions) or if the company is liquidated
it'll be pay (in full or part) out of any money that can be extracted from the
company assets.

------
JVIDEL
I been checking StartupChile for a while but the one thing keeping me from
applying is that many ex-alumni have complained about the lack of a proper
investors network in Chile to provide growth capital once the program is over.

Some have moved overseas or back home with their new companies, which is sort
of the opposite of what this program is all about: creating a startup
ecosystem _in Chile_

Companies leaving the country after seed stage kinda defeats the purpose of
it.

~~~
nico
I don't know if the goals of StartupChile have changed, but the original goal
of the program was to build a network in the global startup/venture community
and connect Chile to the rest of the world, which I think they've done very
well so far.

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batgaijin
Do you have to incorporate in Chile to participate in Startup Chile? Or do you
only have to consider employing local people/making it your hq?

~~~
andrewcooke
neither - <http://startupchile.org/about/faqs/>

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SkyMarshal
That name doesn't quite work. Sounds more like a valley of con men in Chile,
than the Chilean Silicon Valley.

~~~
neutronicus
To me, it sounds like delicious culinary convention in a valley. Not a
negative.

~~~
SkyMarshal
That was my second thought too. Either way, not exactly what was intended.

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EliRivers
"There was the founder of Kwelia.com, which makes software that helps
landlords mint more money from their properties"

Is that really the economist I'm reading? If even they're getting sick of the
rentier class the revolution can't be far behind!

~~~
pchristensen
"makes software that helps $BUSINESS_OWNERS mint more money from their
$BUSINESS_ASSETS"

Pretty much every B2B software can be described in the same sentence - what
else would landlords do with their properties?

------
nirvana
I'm in Chile as a cofounder on a team with multiple nationalities. This
article, unlike most, focuses on the visa aspect and the fact that the USA is
hostile to foreigners who want to start companies there.

This is a huge point. Chile has relatively straightforward residency permit,
and after getting your a 1 year permit extended once (eg: being there 2 years)
they have a straightforward permanent residency process.

For us, this is pretty appealing for after we leave the Startup Chile program.

After all, we can't go back to either of our home countries because if we do
the other half of the founding team will be considered "aliens" and have a
very difficult process of getting residency and work permits, that would be
ongoing-- and that's even assuming we can get permission.

Chile is not perfect- there's a lot of bureaucracy, the business culture is
often lackadaisical, and it is a first world country, so it is not like we're
living in paradise on a discount (well, only a slight discount.)

But they are happy to have us live and work here, and have a variety of
programs to support starting businesses.

In fact, I've heard that private investment is inhibited to some extent
because here, when someone talks about getting financial support for a
startup, everyone just assumes the government will pay for it.

~~~
SimHacker
Hey, how can I contact you besides replying to one of your most recent posts?
Apparently HN doesn't have a private mail system, so this is the only way I
can reply after the discussion has been locked. You wrote a ridiculous ad-
hominem attack to my post calling you on your bullshit a while ago, that I
didn't see until now, and I'd like to follow up.
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4435852> You accused me of being stupid
and not being able to support my claim, but of course I can:
[http://www.beststuff.com/audiovideo/connectedtv-turns-
palm-h...](http://www.beststuff.com/audiovideo/connectedtv-turns-palm-
handheld-into-tv-guide-and-remote-control.html)
<http://www.pencomputing.com/palm/Pen44/connectedTV.html> Do you really still
believe Apple invented finger gestures? That's very naive -- you should do
some research before calling people names.

