Vinod Veedu, who joined Oceanit after earning his Ph.D. in engineering at the University of Hawaii, has racked up a dozen patents at age 37 and conducted countless experiments on live TV in hopes of sparking interest in science among Hawaii kids.
The director of strategic initiatives at Oceanit, one of the state’s top science and engineering companies, originally came to the United States from India on a student visa and was hired by Oceanit in 2006 as a nanotechnology specialist under a visa program for highly skilled workers.
The immigration bill passed recently by the U.S. Senate would give Hawaii companies a better chance of hiring such highly skilled people by substantially raising the quota for H-1B visas. Although the legislation is controversial because it also includes a system through which undocumented residents can become citizens, the visa portion enjoys broad business support and could move forward on its own steam in the Republican-dominated House.
"I think it’s actually a really big win, not just for foreign students, but for the United States," said Ian Kitajima, a senior executive at Oceanit. "The U.S. is an innovative country because of the diversity of our workforce. The same is true at Oceanit."
"You can’t do innovation if everyone is the same, if everyone has the same point of view," he added. "We live the power of diversity every day at Oceanit. We’re like a mini-United Nations. We have people from India, Malaysia, from China, from England."
U.S. businesses use the H-1B visa program to employ foreign workers with expertise in occupations such as science, engineering and computer programming. The number of such visas was capped at 65,000 a year — a figure reached within the first week of the opening of the filing period in April this year. A computer lottery decided the winners among 124,000 applicants.
"The availability of visas goes by so quickly that you never really have a opportunity to make any kind of rational personnel planning," said John Robert Egan, an immigration attorney in Honolulu.
The legislation would immediately raise the cap to 110,000 a year, and it could go as high as 180,000 a year depending on demand. Another 25,000 visas would be set aside for people with advanced degrees in science, technology, engineering or math from a U.S. school, up from the current 20,000 limit. The visas are good for three years and can be renewed for another three.
The bill also includes a new visa to encourage foreign entrepreneurs to start companies in the U.S. and a merit-based visa that would take into account education, employment and length of residence in the U.S.
While some observers fear that foreign employees may displace American workers, research shows that entrepreneurs from abroad have helped build the country’s technology sector and create jobs. A study by the Kauffman Foundation of Kansas City, Mo., found that 25 percent of high-tech companies launched nationwide from 2006 to 2012 had at least one immigrant as a founder. In California’s Silicon Valley, the figure was a whopping 44 percent. The figures are based on a random sample of 1,882 of the 107,819 engineering and technology companies founded across the country during those six years.
American universities attract some of the brightest students from other countries, but many of them leave after earning their degrees. At the University of Hawaii, 27 percent of the graduate students in the College of Engineering come from abroad, according to Dean Peter Crouch, compared with just 1.5 percent at the undergraduate level. About 716 degree-seeking foreign graduate students are enrolled at UH-Manoa, excluding those here only to perfect their English, out of a total graduate enrollment of 5,542 campuswide.
"It’s an interesting situation because clearly the country needs talented science and engineering folks, and on the other hand we want to try and make sure we have jobs for the U.S.-trained students," Crouch said. "It’s a complicated decision for Congress to make."
Crouch knows the immigrant path intimately himself, having come from the United Kingdom and become a naturalized U.S. citizen.
"We need to continue working at our STEM outreach programs and make them better so that we attract more of these types of students locally," Crouch said. "That’s especially what we are trying to do here in Hawaii."
Veedu and his colleagues coached robotics students at Moanalua High School before deciding to try television in hopes of reaching more young people. For nearly four years he woke early every Tuesday to host "Weird Science with Dr. V," a popular five-minute segment featuring eye-catching experiments on Hawaii News Now’s morning news show.
"When you’re called a scientist, you’re not that reachable," Veedu said. "You live in your own world, a science bubble. If you can break out of it and popularize it, you can show everybody it’s not a big challenge. It’s fun."
Veedu joined Oceanit on an H-1B visa and later earned his "green card" for permanent residency. He has blazed trails in nanotechnology, developing nano concrete, which contains sensors to monitor the structural health of buildings and bridges, and has another dozen patents pending on top of the 12 already approved. Nanotechnology involves manipulating materials on an atomic or molecular scale.
Along with Oceanit, local companies seeking H-1B visas for employees in recent years include SSFM International, HMSA and Tetris Online Inc., according to Visa Square’s online site. Higher education is exempt from the quota, and the University of Hawaii and its research arm account for most of the applications from Hawaii.
The number of petitions for H1-B specialty occupation visas approved for Hawaii-based employees fell to 269 in fiscal year 2012, down from 319 the previous year. So far in the 2013 fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30, 205 have been approved.
Many small businesses don’t bother to apply because of the time, paperwork and expense involved, Egan said.
"Our high-tech companies, engineering and other STEM companies are losing out to other states in the talent pool, and that can’t be good for Hawaii," Egan said.
