Fed up with U.S. immigration hurdles, Microsoft announced July 5 plans to open a software development center in Vancouver, British Columbia, that it hopes will "be home to software developers from around the world."

Employing as many as 900 workers within a couple years, the facility, to be called the Microsoft Canada Development Centre, is slated to open in the fall of 2007, though the company said it has not yet determined who will staff the facility.

Analysts were quick to suggest that the move may signal <A HREF="http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,2157871,00.asp?kc=EWKNLEDP071207A">the start of a new hiring trend,</A> in which other technology companies, frustrated with the difficulty of bringing skilled foreign workers to the United States to staff their companies, will follow in Microsoft's footsteps to Canada, where it is easier for foreign nationals to obtain work credentials.