My sense is: - Engineers, while cheaper than the US, are still fairly expensive and are typically quite risk-averse - The investors-to-builders ratio is very high; while it might be good for fundraising, I wonder if having a critical mass of builders is no less important
Curious to hear your thoughts!
In terms of hiring talent, I’ve only tried hiring software and platform engineers here, without much luck. Despite the cost of living, the salaries aren’t too high compared with, say, Europe. But it’s a small market and all the megacorps like Facebook / Google / Apple have their regional headquarters here so you are competing with them. I think for developers the market is pretty bimodal – the good ones go to the megacorps and are super expensive, and everybody else works for local firms and are affordable but not great.
I tried putting a few job ads on MyCareersFuture for an average salary for Singapore, and only got a handful of responses, most of whom were entirely unqualified. Our circumstances changed, so I didn’t keep trying to hire here, but I get the impression MyCareersFuture is only really used to prove to MOM that you tried to hire a local so you can justify a visa to bring somebody into the country. I think most proper hiring is done via word of mouth or LinkedIn here.
I think a lot of people here hire developer teams in Vietnam and nearby areas. Which is certainly cheaper and opens up much bigger markets, but also introduces a language barrier. Also, if you aren’t Singaporean / PR, then your visa will probably require you to spend a significant amount of money and hire locals here sooner or later.
If you’re keen on living in the region as a founder, then I’d say Singapore is the best place to be by far. But you probably aren’t going to build a dev team here.
> I tried putting a few job ads on MyCareersFuture for an average salary for Singapore, and only got a handful of responses, most of whom were entirely unqualified. Our circumstances changed, so I didn’t keep trying to hire here, but I get the impression MyCareersFuture is only really used to prove to MOM that you tried to hire a local so you can justify a visa to bring somebody into the country. I think most proper hiring is done via word of mouth or LinkedIn here. > I think a lot of people here hire developer teams in Vietnam and nearby areas. Which is certainly cheaper and opens up much bigger markets, but also introduces a language barrier.
Yes I think you're right about that. Am I right to understand that you ended up hiring elsewhere as a result? How was your experience in that regard? Yes, I know couple of founders who hire developer teams in Vietnam specifically. What they said is, for the equivalent of a fresh grad's salary (assuming you're getting the good end of that bimodal distribution), you can get a senior engineer in Vietnam. Oh, and I know someone who has dev team in India but I think he's originally from India and was able to tap into local connections to pull this off.
> If you’re keen on living in the region as a founder, then I’d say Singapore is the best place to be by far. But you probably aren’t going to build a dev team here.
So your advice would be to live in Singapore, but build a dev team somewhere else in Southeast Asia?
> It’s pretty easy to meet other founders and investors here. If you’re a founder then it’s a pretty good place to be as far as the entrepreneurial ecosystem is concerned. Antler started here and is very active in the community.
Any specific events you'd recommend?
Thanks in advance!
We ended up pausing hiring and I left that business a few months back.
> So your advice would be to live in Singapore, but build a dev team somewhere else in Southeast Asia?
Generally speaking, yes, with the caveat that how much funding you have and your visa may stack the deck in the other direction.
> Any specific events you'd recommend?
I don’t have any specific recurring events in mind, things mostly happen ad hoc, but just start talking to people and see what one-off events are happening. There’s normally things happening at the Google offices, the incubators normally run events, etc.