I asked how they liked the software and how the office was working out. The response: "Oh, we don't do it for the software. We can hire 100 people out of Ohio State or Michigan and pay them midwest wages and get the same quality. The SV office is for the connections and investors we get."
It's entirely possible that they know exactly what they are doing ;)
No they can't... or they would.
Deeds. Not words.
They also tend to not be aware of the salary ranges out there and I think these traditional companies are exploiting them because most of the engineers really respect the companies and what they stand (or at least stood) for.
In a way I'd love to be a fly on the wall in the boardroom when this is discussed.
Because really, it's sad. I would have taken a significant salary drop to go work on something like this because the Ford office was local to me and the work sounded interesting and potentially more impactful than what I was doing at the time.
Except it's so far below a reasonable rate... and you pretty much know the place would be a crappy workplace producing a substandard product...