Company helps immigrant tech innovators get visas to build startups

Global Business

Ganesh Iyer founded the company IceBreaker Q, an app that connects like-minded people at professional and social gatherings. Iyer works 70 hours a week as a business operations manager at a major tech company, and another 20 hours week at his startup. But because he is an H-1B visa holder, there are restrictions on what role he can play at his own company. CCTV’s Mark Niu reported from Mountain View, California.

Company helps immigrant tech innovators get visas to build startups

Ganesh Iyer founded the company IceBreaker Q, an app that connects like-minded people at professional and social gatherings. Iyer works 70 hours a week as a business operations manager at a major tech company, and another 20 hours week at his startup. But because he is an H-1B visa holder, there are restrictions on what role he can play at his own company. CCTV’s Mark Niu reported from Mountain View, California.

“It becomes much tougher task if you are on an H1-B to not only pursue what you have, but also pursue any new ideas you may have,” Iyer said.

The founding partner of Unshackled and a fellow H1-B visa holder Nitin Pachisia can commiserate on the dilemma of coming up with a great idea, but not being allowed to pursue it full-time.

That’s what led him to develop his latest idea, an angel fund that gets entrepreneurs H-1B visas while letting them pursue their startup dreams full time.

“Venture Capitalists are investing in people, micro funds are investing in people. And they know there is an untapped pool of talent that we can unleash by giving them this opportunity. They are investing in the possibility that Unshackled brings,” Pachisia said.

The angel fund has raised $3.5 million and reads as a who’s who of influences in the tech world.

Pachisia was hired by American partner Manan Mehta, an entrepreneur whose previous startup shut down mainly because his partner was forced to work another full-time job to keep his H-1B visa.

“A lot of cases of individuals that have buried their idea, that they either created as to graduating from top universities. Or they thought about it while they were working in the industry. You see them be stifled by the fact that you know, I can’t go and work on that full time. The burying of that idea really kills the innovation cycle that America promises,” Mehta said.

Unshackled is now on the lookout for 20-25 entrepreneurs or teams to invest in, which means they will pay them full salaries and benefits, get visas, office space and leverage their network of contacts. In return, Unshackled will get between a 3-12 percent equity stakes in each company.

The hope is that the fund’s infrastructure leads immigrant teams to their seed-round of capital, which would also give them enough power to gain their own visas and green cards and ultimately be unshackled.