Offer: Yahoo, LINE
Thank Letter: Google, Amazon Ring, AICS, Numbers
No Response: Microsoft, Dell, Nvidia
Background: National Taiwan University Electrical Engineering Junior with 1 internship experience in a web startup.
Disclaimer: It is never intended to be helpful. It is very verbose, and it is more like a journal than a … idk, informative post?
Cold applied on its career site for 2 roles: SWE Intern & Silicon Intern. A week later, HR called me and told me that my resume is picked up by a testing team, and asked me if I’m interested. I was like, why not, I had basically no experience in the silicon part anyways, so I agreed to be transferred to that team. 2 weeks later, I had the 1st interview with the team.
It is pretty strange tbh. 60% of the interview is conducted in English, and most of the questions are behavioral ones, with only very few technical questions. The technical questions are pretty easy, was asked about some of the frequently used Linux commands, and the difference between SQL & NoSQL databases, etc. Some of the behavioral questions are pretty tough tho. Overall, I thought I did pretty well, and was expecting to have a 2nd interview. But no. I got a rejection mail 1.5 months later.
As for the SWE intern part, I’d never heard from them. Seemed like I applied too late. Should have submitted the application in at least December, but I only submitted it in January. Google SWE is just too prestigious. Wonder how many applications they got.
Yahoo (DevOps)
View in Glassdoor. (Has typos, please don’t judge. Can’t edit it as much as I want to.)
Write it after the whole internship, and I just want to say, Yahoo’s culture is really great. The vibe is awesome.
Cold applied on its workday site. 1st interview was about some Linux commands and system & networking knowledge. 2nd interview was still about those things but more like system design, like a super lightweight system design. There are also some simple Python LC easy level coding questions. 3rd interview is an HR interview, not really like an interview tbh, more like a get-to-know meeting.
The 2 technical interviews are conducted by 2 people, which turned out to be my mentors. They’re super nice, and the more senior one would even give me some head starts when I was a bit unsure how to answer. Overall, the whole interview experience was super great, the best I have among all of the interviews I’ve been through.
Got an offer later and accepted it.
See my review about this internship.
Amazon (Ring)
2 consecutive interview rounds, 1hr each. Could only use C or C++., no Python. All were LC mediums with some follow-ups. Didn’t answer some of the follow-ups very well. I was asked about some embedded systems problems since it’s Amazon Ring, and I couldn’t answer most of them, as I have no experience in embedded systems, and was rejected later.
Why can’t FAANG just let me in, and why are there only 2 of the FAANG here in Taiwan …
AICS
The newish software org of ASUS.
Bombed the 1st interview and was rejected after. I was super dumb that day. The interviewer gave me the most obvious hint and I somehow still didn’t get it.
2 LC mediums. 1st one is a super classic one, 2nd one is a dp.
LINE
If you don’t know what is LINE, it’s a popular messaging app in Eastern Asia, especially in Japan, Taiwan, Thailand, and Indonesia. Personally, I don’t really like the UI/UX (among other things) of LINE, but that’s irrelevant.
The official time period of this internship is July 2022 to June 2023, and I’d already accepted Yahoo’s summer internship offer, but I still applied anyway, because the more interviews I do, the better I become at future interviews.
The interview was pretty special. There was a take-home project, and in the interview, no leetcode type questions were asked at all. Instead, you were asked about your past experiences and the take-home project, in extreme detail. It was so detailed that if your past experience stories were made up or that your take-home project was done by somebody else, you would most probably be exposed.
And then I got my offer, as I expected. I put a lot of effort into my take-home project, and my past experience was also very relevant, so I didn’t really consider the possibility of not getting the offer tbh.
They were kind enough to let me move the starting date to September, after I complete my Yahoo summer internship. Appreciate it very much.
See my review about this internship.
CMoney
CMoney is a Taiwanese company focusing on stock information, sort of like Yahoo Finance I guess? Personally never used it. Maybe stumbled upon their website like 1 or 2 times?
The CTO of it dm me on 104, a Taiwanese career website, like Linkedin (but worse). He said that he’s also (sort of) an NTUEE graduate, got a PhD from NTU GIEE, and wanted to have a talk with me about possible positions.
I already accepted the offer from Yahoo then, but I was like, why not? Just a talk, right? And if I was actually interested, it’s still possible to intern for them, just not in the summer. Plus him being an NTUEE graduate really made me feel a bit of intimacy.
So, I met with him on Google Meet, and it was the most awkward interview (if it counted as an interview) ever. He gave a brief introduction about their company and products, and then we had some Q&As. Everything went pretty well, until he found out that I already accepted an offer and was not available in the summer. He then said something like “so we’re here just for a small talk then” (lost something in the translation) in a ….. slightly passive-aggressive way? And then it became super awkward. I still tried to come up with some other questions to ask, but it’s not like I have infinite questions to ask, so after I ran out of my questions, and after a couple of seconds of silent awkwardness, we ended it.
I kind of feel bad about him, because he probably thought that I was messing with him? But I was really not. He seemed to be spamming every NTUEE student he can find on 104 tho. One of my friends also got it, and I also saw a senior actually taking the offer (from his Linkedin profile).
Numbers
A web3 startup in Taiwan. I have zero experience or knowledge in web3 and blockchain, so I applied.
I was asked a LC easy first, and so many behavioral questions after. Seemed pretty weird to me. Why did a small company care so much about behavioral questions? Shouldn’t they be focusing on my technical skills more?
The company seemed to be doing some meaningful things with web3, like cooperating with Reuters during the 2020 elections in archiving facts, plus I really wanted to know more about blockchain and web3, so I was really interested in the internship. It was a shame that they rejected me. I think it is because I told them I wasn’t available in the summer, as I already accepted a summer internship (Yahoo). It was already April then btw, so I can totally understand if they rejected me for that reason.