Flipkart Interview Experience for SDE Internship 2021

Flipkart recently visited our campus for the recruitment of SDE internship 2021. Students of CSE, EC, EE having a minimum CGPA of 7.0 were eligible to apply for this position. Nearly 250 students applied for it.

There was a shortlist based on resume – Nearly 180 students were shortlisted for further rounds.

Round 1 (Coding Round): This round was conducted on aspiring minds – AMCAT platform. We were given three questions to solve in 90 mins.

1. Given an integer n. we can rearrange digits of n. we need to find the least possible number(magnitude wise) after rearranging its digits. (number cannot have leading zeroes)

   Example:
   

   1352 : 1235
   -4302 : -2034
   

2. Given an undirected graph. We need to find the max sum in a connected component. Similar question: max sum in a connected component

3. There are n mics with jury and m groups with various sizes. Initially, every team is provided a single mike. Now we need to split teams into n groups such that the maximum size of a group is minimized. We need to find such a minimum-maximum size of the group.

   Example:
   

   n=3 m=2 size[2]={10,30}

   30 people are splitted into two gropus of size 15 each…so {10,15,15}, so answer is 15(we can’t have a better partition than this)

Answer codes were also tested on hidden system test cases after the round.13 Students were shortlisted for further rounds.

Round 2 (Technical Interview): Due to the current pandemic situation, the Interview was taken virtually. It was held on Google meet, and I was provided a google doc to write pseudocodes.

1. Sort an array into waveform array. I was asked to dry run on some test cases and to estimate time and space complexities.

   https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/problems/wave-array-1587115621/1

2. There is a city in the form of an n×m matrix where each cell represents the state of persons living at that cell (i,j).This matrix contains only 3 values..{0,1,2}.

   • 0 means COVID affected and recovered(can’t get affected by COVID again)
   • 1 means an active COVID patient
   • 2 means a normal person…..

   An active COVID patient affects a normal person who is residing adjacent to him side-wise in 1 day. Find the number of days required to affect all normal people or say if it is not possible at all.

   Similar question: Time required to rot oranges

   I gave him a BFS solution and was asked to dry run on some cases as well as time and space complexities.

This round went well for me… I didn’t get stuck at any point in the whole process. It was about half an hour. 7/13 were qualified for the next round

Round 3 (Technical Interview): This interview was held on the AMCAT platform. The interviewer was so friendly. He started first by introducing himself. By explaining his role in the firm. His developments over the years, and the same I did next.

1. Given an integer array an of size n. We need to build another array b of size n, where b[i] represents the next immediate greater element to a[i] which is present to the right side of i.
   https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/problems/next-larger-element-1587115620/1

   Example:
   

   a = { 10 , 8 , 6 , 12 , 9 , 7 , 15 }
   b = { 12 , 9 , 7 , 15 , 15 , 15 , -1}
   

   Firstly, I told him a solution using set and made a dry run on a test case…then I was asked not to use c++ and to code in c itself. After thinking of 4-5 mins I was able to come up with an AVL tree solution…I was asked to dry run and to find time as well as space complexities.

2. Pair sum in a binary search tree. I gave him two different solutions, and he was quite impressed with both of my approaches. https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/problems/find-a-pair-with-given-target-in-bst/1

3. Given a character array an of size n and an integer array b of size n. Array b is a permutation of {1,2,3,…n}. We need to modify array a such that at b[i]th position of array a should be replaced with a[i].

   Similar problem – https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/permute-the-elements-of-an-array-following-given-order/

   Example:

   a = { e , f , a , d , g , b }
   b = { 6 , 3 , 1 , 5 , 4 , 2 }
   new a = { a , b , f , g , d , e }
   

   I gave him O(n) extra space solution. I was then asked to make it in constant space. I was telling him all the approaches that all stroke my mind. At last, after 10 to 12 mins, I came up with an optimal solution.

This round lasted nearly 50 mins….6/7 were called for the next round.

Round 4 (HR Interview): This round was conducted on Google meet, and I was interviewed by a senior HR. He was quite friendly and so interactive. This  round mainly focused on behavioral questions

Firstly I was asked my introduction….and followed by a few questions like

1. What are your strengths and weaknesses?
2. How did you manage conflicts among your teammates when u worked on a project?
3. What all the things you learned from your college
4. What driven you to study software engineering
5. Share one of your experiences where you felt proud of yourselves.

Apart from these other questions were also asked. Finally, I was opened to ask him any queries regarding the firm or job role. I asked him a lot of questions regarding the work and growth culture at the firm and the kind of projects assigned to us as an intern so on…

Finally, 5 out of 6 were given an internship opportunity