YoE: 12, TC 250k+, SW Eng director I've lived in the Bay Area for the last 12 years and my wife and I are looking to move to the Boston area in the next year or so to be closer to family and to live somewhere slightly more affordable. I have friends in the Boston tech scene that have had good things to say, but im curious to get an outside perspective. What's the scene like? What are the best places to work? What do you enjoy and dislike about it? Edit: planning on living in the burbs, not in Boston proper
Amazon is expanding there
Amazon, Facebook, google. In upcoming startup toast is noteworthy
Though the scene is no where comparable to Bay Area
No one at 15 yoe cares about "the scene".
I mean tech/startup opportunity scene
Google in Cambridge.
Is it just Google cloud in Cambridge?
Way more than that, there are nearly 1K googlers work for dozens different of PAs in Cambridge
I lived there for 7 yrs. love the city. Love everything about it except the 6 months of winter. And don’t kid yourself, it’s affordable only if you live 30-40 miles from the city. If your in Boston zip code it’s as expensive as California. In fact food (eating out) is more expensive
The scene is no where comparable to the bay area. Pay is lesser and frankly this place is pretty expensive if you want a good schooling district with good connectivity to the city. Moreover houses are old, very old and the new ones cost a bomb. Baring Amazon, Google, FB, Wayfair there aren’t many companies which pays a lot. Since your family lives here you must already be aware of the weather etc. Regarding opportunities Amazon is the only big company with many openings, the others really have very limited openings. Their so called expansions are also more for like 200-300 employees etc and Amazon pays lesser than their Seattle employees. As a pro, diversity is number 1, not everyone is a tech bro here. Cambridge, medford, sommerville have a pretty mixed crowd. Rents in these places and other close by areas are as much as the bay area. I personally feel, you get more value out of your money in the bay area (apart from buying a house).
Facebook has a large new-ish office in Kendall that is hiring for eng
Boston and Cambridge has the best tech companies. Suburbs are just average companies but nothing really wrong with that. Look in Burlington or Waltham areas for suburban tech companies.
New York
No thanks
Whats your background (work) and what are the ideal requirements for new city?
Currently Engineering director, planning on living in the burbs
You should be able to find a lot of places to work. Amzn, Oracle, weworks, etc are there. The closet good schools - suburbs near boston is Lexington, newton. Check out those and scope out. Message me if you need specific info - i lived in mass for 9 years.