Arcesium Internship process

Stage-1

Branches allowed : CSE, IT, ECE, EE

CPI Cut-off : 7.0 & above - CSE, IT

                      8.0 & above - ECE, EE

Intern location : Hyderabad

Stipend : 1 lakh per month (internship is of exact 60 days)

Provision of PPO : Yes

Stage 2

Online coding round, first question was on strings and second was simple brute force. The constraints where hypothetical, even if u dont feel like that your solution will pass then also implement it.

Stage 3

-> Backstory

My only Interview preparation was during, when I was sitting outside and waiting for my turn for the Interviews and I didn’t have any projects. Neither do I have practiced on InterviewBit or leetcode but I had invested a lot of time on Codechef, Codeforces, Hackerearth,Spoj. My CV was around the Competitive Programming that I have done till then and some good ranks that I have got. Also, me and my roommate had participated in Operamania (the quizzing event under cyberquest) and had achieved something like 4th-5th rank, so I mostly knew most of the puzzles.

Interview was at night. There were 3 Technical and 1 HR round. 

-> Technical 1st Round

I was asked a standard problem which I didn't know about, I gave answer through a different approach and that's what made be different. And one usual question about 25 horses and finding three fastest in it. Got selected for next technical which was scheduled on next day.

-> Technical 2nd Round

A puzzle was asked, which was new to me, I was giving up but then tried again and this time it was correct. 

Coding question- Find if it is possible to divide a set of no. into two sets such that sum of two is equal. { Gave a DP approach, Brute force type approach based on sets, Meet in the middle(was trying for it, but did not able to explain it very well) }

One more question which I don't remember.

Asked one more puzzle which I said I had seen earlier and he changed the puzzle, I again said I had seen it but then he persisted to solve it. To be honest I didn’t remember the solution for the previous one and the current one was much easier.

-> Technical 3rd Round

A question on DP. I gave the best approach and gave it as soon as he finished speaking. He asked me if I can improve it, I checked for some time and said no.

All in all, I was asked 4 questions and some puzzles in all the rounds.

-> HR round 

The key to HR round is to stay honest and don’t fumble. You fumble only when you have a fear of losing. I never hoped to get selected this quickly so I didn’t have much tension in mind.

Results

2 students including me got selected for the internship at Arcesium.

General Tips

My interview Experience is not a general one. Follow it if your Competitive Programming is very strong. I don't have projects, It's actually not a boon, I have seen rejection at DE Shaw on the basis that I didn’t know basic OOPs concepts. If you have done hard work then surely you will get selected in some company.

Keshav Sharma

CSE Batch of 2021