

Ask YC: Can a person in US on F-1 Student Visa be a co-founder? - immigrationhelp

And if you don't know the answer to this, would be nice if someone could recommend a good immigration lawyer.
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yawl
Assuming you are on F1 visa without OPT, you can be a co-founder, but you can
not 'work' for this company you found. The key is not about making money or
not, you can receive passive income like dividend. You are not allowed to
'work', even volunteering will violate your status.

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hollerith
IANAL, or even an immigrant, but I am almost sure that the US legal system
will never take away your stock (or any other property you may come to own in
the US) because US law protects property rights very well. If there are
adverse legal consequences, they will almost certainly be restricted to two
things: (1) your ability to remain a legal resident of the US or to become a
citizen of the US and (2) whether you will have to pay a higher tax rate on
your capital gains from the startup than you would have if you were a citizen
or if you held a green card.

A minor consideration is that the bureaucrats in the U.S. government earn
lower incomes than most mangerial-class Americans (although they are much less
likely to lose their job) and that about 90% of the employees of the U.S.
government have left-of-center political beliefs, which usually include some
amount of resentment towards successful capitalists and high-income earners.
Consequently, an immigration bureaucrat will probably envy the income or
assets of a successful technology cofounder. Usually the rules dictate the
bureaucrat's decision, but in a case where the rules are silent, envy might
make the difference between a favorable immigration decision and an
unfavorable one. But like I said, most of the time the bureaucrat's choice
will be forced by the rules, and if the rules dictate a favorable decision,
then the bureaucrat will have to make a favorable decision no matter how
envious he is (or you will be able to force a favorable outcome by spending a
moderate amount of legal costs).

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ashu
Yes, F-1 students can be co-founders. (I personally did this.) The only
restriction is that you cannot _earn_ any money _personally_ from the company
(via dividends or by selling stock) unless you have a work visa or an OPT.

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pepeto
Actually, from what I know, you can sell, and buy, you can pay dividends to
yourself (though you doubletax your own behind). What you can't do is be hired
if you are on F-1 visa, which means that you can't get a regular paycheck or
have a position in the company (owner/shareholder is not a position).

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ashu
Ah, thanks for the clarification. I quickly got on to an OPT in 15 days after
founding the company, and became an employee of the company, so none of that
mattered, but it's certainly good to know!

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deeter
Sure, as long as you are not making money from it :) Technically, you are not
allowed to earn income from anything besides an on-campus job (unless you get
a waiver from INS, which is very rare... they must be convinced of your
"extenuating circumstances" to approve such a waiver)

But I could be wrong, I'm no professional. Your university might know about
any loopholes and stuff and would probably know some immigration lawyers in
the area.

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theoutlander
The whole bloody system here SUX!

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tyrant
so what exactly should be done to deal with this situation?

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cayman
technically, the answer is no.

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ashu
reference?

