Hello, I´m European as well, and I often thought about doing something similar (i.e. moving to US for a period of time looking for work). I have already been in Silicon Valley for an internship (with a researcher visa) years ago and loved the place, but I always thought that getting a working Visa would be hard, since the company basically has to petition for your visa and pay all the associated legal expenses.
In your experience then, is it something that can be done (I guess so given that you had 3 interviews already).? Or do companies gives you a hard time if you don´t have a work permit to start with ?
Yes it can be done, but its extremely tough if it is your first visa application (much easier to do a transfer). In that case you'd want the company to petition for you while you were interning (h1-b cap opens in April if I remember correctly) so that after your internship you could get approved and start in October (thats when you're allowed to start working).
The trick is to know all the ins and outs of the process (or get an experienced immigration attorney to advise you), so that if any issues come up you (preferably your attorney) can walk them through the process. It really isn't that hard, but not a lot of people bother to sit down and learn how to do it correctly.
The other thing is that if you can pay the associated costs on your own, then you can insulate the company from the process to a large degree ... I'm not sure that option is still available though, as I think it has been changed to require the company to pay all the fees on their own.
Hey, well I've been married to an American citizen for 5 years before coming over here so I got my green card recently after applying about 6 months ago.
Because I don't require any sort of sponsorship I think I have more opportunities than someone who does.
I'm afraid I can't really say for sure if you will have a harder time trying to get interviews when requiring sponsorship, but my opinion would be that yes, you will find it more difficult.
In your experience then, is it something that can be done (I guess so given that you had 3 interviews already).? Or do companies gives you a hard time if you don´t have a work permit to start with ?
Thanks.