Moving to the US after YC: SF, NYC... or Miami?

“Why aren’t you in San Francisco already? Do you really think you’re gonna build a billion dollar SaaS out of Paris?”

“Why would you move? Such a waste of your investors’ money, the best engineers are in France.”

“San Francisco died big time, NYC is the place.”

“Miami? Are you kidding me? It’s just for retirees or influencers! You’re so much better than that, at least, I thought.”

This is what my inbox looks like as a founder. Multiply this by the infinite number of topics or decisions that need to be made: hiring, launching, pricing, etc. I know I signed up for this, but you wouldn’t believe the number of opinions people have and share with you, whether you asked for them or not. One of the toughest things for a founder is to know when to listen to others, and when to ignore them.

Here are the principles I’ve defined towards the question. These are my personal views, feel free to iterate on this framework based on your own taste :).

Your priority as a founder is to keep yourself motivated, and sane

This trumps everything else. Do you like the city you’d move to? Does your partner like it? Would they be able to find a satisfying job there? What about your kids? In my case, I had been many times in San Francisco and nearby - my family emigrated there because of the Vietnam war - and have never been a big fan of the city. It has, in theory, everything I’d like: lots of smart people, mild weather, surf, nature, and amazing food. However, I simply can’t stand the contrast between spending the day in fully catered offices (massages, all you can eat food, etc.) and bumping into a series of homeless people on my way home. Also, I’m too used to having people from diverse backgrounds around me in Paris, and San Francisco has become so expensive that most people who can afford it would be working in tech. This isn’t meant to be a sociological analysis of San Francisco, it’s just how it makes me feel when I go there.

Conclusion

I love visiting but don’t see myself moving there full-time.

Don’t underestimate the importance of timezones

Some people said I’d love Los Angeles: surf, sun, creative people. I discarded it because I wasn’t excited enough to choose the West coast anyway. When you wake up in the morning in Los Angeles or in San Francisco at 8am, it’s already 5pm in Paris. The overlap is very thin. This means the teams would need to compromise with early or late-night calls as a structural part of their lifestyle.

Conclusion

The East coast seemed much more attractive: 8am in NYC is 2pm in Paris. You have a full half-day of overlap with Europe, and a full half day with the US West coast. It’s the best of both worlds to me, to have enough overlap and enough “deep work” time.

If a founder isn’t in the US, don’t expect to hire top talent there

I always questioned the reasons to move to the US. There are a litany of examples of companies who were successful from Europe, and others who spent a lot of time and money in the US before retreating: N26, Sunday, for instance.

The US is obviously one of the largest markets for B2B SaaS, so it makes sense to build a go-to-market team locally. It’s possible to sell from Europe, but more complex, as it’s always better to have a US sales team to sell to US companies.

However, regarding product and engineering talent, I think we have a sizable competitive advantage in Europe: great engineers, who trust our track record with European scale-ups (including a $5B fintech unicorn) and our leadership as founders. This trust is much harder to build in a new country, especially at an earlier stage, and takes several years to really build.

Conclusion

If we were a 100% self-serve company, I don’t think it’d be necessary to open a US office anytime soon. When we hire US sales folks, I need to move there, otherwise, we won’t attract the best talent. Hiring company-defining employees at each stage is already a huge challenge - and my main job as a CEO -, so we’d better put all the chances on our side.

Other things I heard I don’t give a s**** about

“The investor pool is much bigger in the US.”

That’s true. But we’re already a US-incorporated company. So we can meet and build relationships with US investors when we travel there and Zoom exists for a reason. The point is to build a great company that is in a good position to raise, it’s not a networking competition, at least not past the pre-seed stage. So that’s an ancillary reason to move to the US, but can’t be the main driver.

“Miami isn’t for serious companies - whatever that means -. ”

I grew up on a tiny island in the Indian Ocean. The Ocean makes me happy, a better person and founder. I couldn’t care less about the parties at Miami beach, and resent the “bling culture” attached to Miami. But Miami is very big and has different vibes and neighborhoods. The things that matter to me in Miami: (i) I can live by the sea and it’s sunny: this brings me joy, (ii) the timezone is compatible with Europe, (iii) it takes 20 minutes to go to the airport (which isn’t a S**** Show like JFK in NYC.). Taxes are better as well, but it should be an ancillary reason, not the main driver either. Last but not least, I’ve always dreamt of having a dog, and Miami is super dog-friendly (dog owners here will agree!)

I’m not saying I’ll move there for sure, I’m saying that if an employee, a customer, or an investor think we can’t deliver from there, maybe it wouldn’t have been a good partnership anyway.

I hope this was useful, let me know what was your decision process to move or not to move!

Anh-Tho