Why read.
In this eye-opening piece, a battle-tested ortho medtech leader—who's championed H-1B hires from India, China, and Malaysia for their unmatched smarts and grit—unpacks how Trump's new $100K visa fee could cripple U.S. innovation in orthopedic devices, forcing startups to ditch global talent amid a booming market and risk exporting breakthroughs to friendlier shores.
My personal story
I am pro H-1B. In my career I hired three employees from India, China and Malaysia - the process wasn't easy, alot of paperwork and expenses but all three hires were excellent, very smart and outworked most American citizen employees.
However, things are about to change as of this week.
What has changed
Imagine this: It's a humming Friday afternoon in the R&D lab of a boutique orthopedic device startup in Austin. Priya Sharma—PhD from IIT Bombay, whiz at finite element modeling, the kind of biomedical engineer who can simulate stress on a titanium femoral stem before breakfast—is tweaking prototypes for a next-gen porous-coated acetabular cup. She's been with us for 18 months, her algorithms slashing iteration times on our bioactive implants by 25%, turning what used to be a six-month sl...
