I'd also add that Atlassian are a well-known user of immigrant labour under an Australian visa scheme similar to the H1-B. They are hugely pro-immigration publicly also. (Despite this, their founder just bought a huge mansion in a very expensive part of Sydney completely protected from population growth due to restrictive bylaws).
I'd propose that they are hiring cheap workers just to keep the ship afloat, rather than to radically improve it.
I’d propose that you’re wrong - with relocation and visa costs it’s significantly more expensive to bring in someone from overseas. Not to mention it’s frequently 3-4 months after interviewing before they can start, as opposed to 3-4 weeks for a local hire. We hire as many local people as we can, the interview process isn’t any different.
The other aspect of the founders believing in the importance of being able to hire talent from overseas is actually at the higher levels - the local talent pool of managers with 10+ years experience running large SaaS orgs is pretty small, given the industry here is fledgling. We’ve developed our own leaders internally, but there’s no substitute for bringing in an external hire to develop the next generation of leaders.
