Eastern Europe for North American teams
Nearshore software development for the USA and Canada: what Romania can offer
In shortWeDevelop is a Romanian software company that works with US and Canadian companies as a remote development partner, with enough overlap with the US East Coast for a working afternoon. It suits teams that can plan around a seven-hour difference and want senior Magento, Next.js or DevOps engineers under a contract with full IP assignment. West Coast teams should expect mostly asynchronous work.
At a glance
- Provider
- WeDevelop, a software company from Romania
- Clients
- Romania, the EU, the UK and North America
- Languages
- English and Romanian
- Invoicing
- EUR, GBP or RON
- Pricing
- Quoted after scoping, from your brief
- Contact
- office@wedevelop.ro
01Is this for you
When Romania works for a North American team
Strictly speaking, Romania is not nearshore for North America, even if that is the term you searched for. It can still work well, under these conditions.
- Your team is on Eastern time, or close to it, and your mornings can carry the live discussion.
- The work can move forward without someone answering questions all day, such as a defined module or a platform migration.
- You need specific skills, for example Magento, Next.js or DevOps, that are hard to find quickly at home.
- You value a supplier that works under EU data protection law, particularly if you also sell in Europe.
- You want to interview the actual engineers rather than buy capacity from a pool.
02What to settle
What a US or Canadian buyer should settle first
None of this is unusual, but all of it is easier to agree before work starts. It is general information rather than legal or tax advice.
Hours
Romania is normally seven hours ahead of New York and Toronto and ten ahead of Los Angeles and Vancouver. The shared time on the East Coast is your morning and our afternoon.
IP ownership
Under US law, code from an independent company is generally not work made for hire by default. Ownership rests on a written assignment, and ours gives you all IP from the first commit.
Data flows both ways
We are established in the EU, so GDPR covers our processing even for American users. Sending data back needs a basis, such as the EU-US Data Privacy Framework or standard contractual clauses.
Sector rules
If the work touches health or card data, raise it during scoping. We do not claim HIPAA compliance, and keeping engineers away from live data may be the simplest route.
Paying us
We invoice monthly in EUR, GBP or RON, so a US or Canadian buyer carries the exchange-rate movement. US payers often also ask a foreign vendor for a W-8BEN-E form.
Canada differs
Toronto keeps East Coast hours, while Vancouver matches the Pacific. PIPEDA applies to your side, the EU treats commercial organisations under it as adequate, and GST/HST self-assessment may need a look.
03Which option
US hire, Latin America, Eastern Europe or South Asia
Each of these has a real case. If live collaboration matters most to you, the honest answer may not be us.
| Option | Fits when | Trade-off |
|---|---|---|
| Domestic hire or contractor | The role is core and permanent, or it needs full-day collaboration, US residency or clearance. | Usually the highest cost to hire and the slowest to fill, though everything is simple legally. |
| Latin America | You want engineers working all or most of your hours, which is true nearshore for the US. | A strong choice for pairing and fast feedback. We do not offer it, and quality depends on the provider you choose. |
| Romania, with us | You are on or near Eastern time and can live with a shared afternoon, and want a small senior team under EU rules. | Little or no live overlap with the Pacific, invoices in EUR, GBP or RON, and overnight turnaround on many questions. |
| South Asia | The scope is well specified, the volume is high and you are comfortable with round-the-clock handovers. | Almost no shared hours with North America, so specifications and process have to do the work that conversation would. |
If your team sits on the West Coast and you need someone in your stand-up at ten in the morning Pacific time, please choose differently. That is eight in the evening in Romania, and we will not promise otherwise.
04Cost
What decides the cost for a North American buyer
We quote per role after a short call. We make no savings claim for your market, because your comparison depends on your own numbers.
| Factor | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| Seniority and stack | These set the monthly figure per role, as they do everywhere. |
| Allocation | A full-time engineer differs from part-time help, and a team with a tech lead differs from either. |
| Your domestic baseline | Compare the quote with salary, benefits, recruiting fees, equipment and management time for the same role at home. |
| Exchange rate | Invoices are not in your currency, so build a margin for movement between USD or CAD and EUR into the budget. |
| Legal and compliance setup | Reviewing IP terms, data transfer clauses and vendor forms takes counsel's time once, at the start. |
| Asynchronous overhead | Fewer shared hours mean more written specifications and clearer tickets, which is time your team has to invest. |
There is no recruitment fee or buy-out, and the contract has a 30-day notice period. For a small test, a short fixed-scope piece of work will show you how the overlap feels before you commit to a team.
05How to start
How to start across seven time zones
Scoping call
Thirty minutes in your morning, which is our afternoon, on the stack, the seniority and how your team communicates.
Profiles and interviews
CVs and code samples for specific engineers, then interviews during the shared hours.
Contract
Framework agreement in your jurisdiction or ours, NDA, written IP assignment and data processing terms, reviewed by your counsel.
First sprint
The engineer joins your sprint, with agreed core hours and written handovers, and the first month is a mutual trial.
06For concrete profiles
What to include in your first message
Tell us about your time zone first, since it decides whether we should talk at all.
- Where the people who will work with the engineers sit, and which hours they keep.
- The stack, the work and the number of engineers.
- Whether personal, health or payment data is involved, and whether engineers need to see it.
- The governing law you want, and who on your side reviews vendor contracts.
- Any vendor forms, security reviews or currency requirements your finance team insists on.
07Questions
What US and Canadian companies ask
How much does a Romanian developer cost for a US company?
We quote per role after a short call, because the figure depends on seniority, stack and allocation, and we do not publish rates. We also do not offer a savings percentage for the US, so compare the quote with the full cost of the same role at home.
How much time zone overlap do we get with the US?
With the East Coast there is enough overlap for a proper working afternoon on our side, which is your morning, given a usual difference of seven hours. With the Pacific, ten hours apart, there is little or none, so work there is mostly asynchronous.
Will this work for a team in California or Vancouver?
Only if your process runs comfortably on written updates and overnight turnaround, because a ten-hour difference leaves almost no shared working time. If you depend on live collaboration all day, a Latin American provider or a domestic hire will serve you better.
Do we own the code a Romanian company writes for us?
Yes, the contract assigns all intellectual property to you from the first commit, and the work happens in your repositories. A written assignment matters here, because under US law an independent company's code generally does not count as work made for hire on its own.
Does GDPR apply if our users are in the US?
It can, because GDPR covers processing by an organisation established in the EU, and that includes us as your processor. In practice this means a data processing agreement and a basis for sending data back to you. Your counsel should review how it applies to your case.
Can you invoice in US dollars?
Our standard invoicing currencies are EUR, GBP and RON, and US dollars are not among them. If your finance team needs USD invoices, raise it in the first conversation so it can be settled before the contract. Otherwise, plan for currency movement in your budget.
Do you have clients in the US?
Yes, North America is a regular part of our work. Our public US example is Lorandka, a low-voltage contractor in the Washington-Baltimore region, for whom we built a React website, which is a website project rather than a long-term engineering team.
How do data rules differ for a Canadian company?
Canadian commercial organisations subject to PIPEDA benefit from an EU adequacy decision, so data can usually return to them without extra transfer clauses. Provincial rules such as Quebec's may add requirements on your side, so have your privacy lead check them.
08Related projects
Work we have done in this area
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