STOCK ANSWER (I get this a lot) Q: “Curt: What were you doing in Ukraine?” I wen

STOCK ANSWER
(I get this a lot)
Q: “Curt: What were you doing in Ukraine?”

I went to Ukraine on the advice of friends, to start a tech company. I’d had my third nearly fatal illness in 2012. After surgery I decided I wanted to “Get away from what was making me ill.”

So I looked for somewhere to start a smaller company that was more ‘a bunch of guys having fun making money’ than a corporation with all its stresses. Developers cost about 200K fully loaded in Seattle, where I’m from. That means you give up half or more of your company to investors at the start. In Ukraine the SAME developer is only 40K, rent is trivial, and there are essentially no taxes on startups. (And people are nicer than Americans, the food is better, and quality of life is better. 😉 ) So that means you can pay five developers in Ukraine for the price of one developer in the States, plus pay no taxes until you make revenue. And in my case that meant I didn’t need to give the company away to investors. Just fund it myself with friends.

I just loved it there enough to get married and stay permanently. The Maydan revolution kind of hurt. Caused delays. Added costs. And got seriously ill again. So I came to the states to recover and raise another round of funding. (Then all this and other things happened.) If I’m ever healthy enough again, and it’s ever safe enough again, I’ll go back for certain.

-Cheers

(BTW: Honesty: There are also a bunch of other rumors about my time in Ukraine and most of them have at least a grain of truth in them. 😉 Better to admit it than have the rumors grow into fish stories. It’s not that interesting. 😉 )