Qualcomm Experience

The recruitment process consisted of 4 rounds.

Round 1: Online MCQ Test

The test had 3 sections: Aptitude, Technical, and a section respective of the course (CSE, ECE, and EEE). Each section had 20 questions, carrying 1 mark for correct answers and a 0.25 negative marking for wrong answers. The time allotted was 90 minutes.

Aptitude questions were easy to average, presenting situations and requiring answers based on them. The Technical section consisted of questions on OOPS concepts, Data Structures, Operating Systems, and 2-3 questions about logical gates. The third section (CSE) included Input/Output questions from C, C++, and questions about the properties of certain concepts.

I was able to answer an average of 13 questions from each section. They selected 75 people for the next round from approximately 500 candidates.

Round 2: Technical Interview – 1

The interviewer was cool and friendly, even offering me banana chips. I handed him my resume, and he was slightly impressed with the number of projects I had completed (5). I had provided Play Store links for the Android apps, allowing him to view my projects.

He asked me to explain one of my projects for about 10 minutes, and I even asked for his suggestions, which seemed to increase his interest in me and my projects. He then asked me to explain machine learning, which I did, relating it to my project.

When asked if I knew about wireless networks, I replied no. He responded, “cool, no problem,” suggesting he preferred an honest answer over guessing. He then asked why we need different data structures, and I explained that data needs to be stored differently for various applications (e.g., Stack for displaying messages, Queue for printers).

This round went smoothly for me, with questions solely based on my resume.

Round 3: Technical Interview – 2

This round had two interviewers. Thankfully, I had brought two copies of my resume, which they appreciated. They stated they were familiar with my resume and asked me to discuss my core subjects. I chose Data Structures.

They inquired about the worst-case search time complexity of a BST. I replied it would be less than the number of elements in the tree. The interviewer then asked about a right-skewed tree, and I explained that by rotating it, we could reduce the number of searches. He asked me to prove it. I demonstrated some rotations and showed him a tree diagram, which satisfied him.

He then moved on to Operating Systems questions, starting with the difference between processes and threads, why threads are preferred over new processes, what deadlock is, how to resolve it, and the difference between mutex and semaphore. All these questions stemmed from my previous answers. He seemed satisfied after a few questions.

The other interviewer then asked me to write a program to calculate X to the power of Y, given X and Y. I initially wrote it using a for loop. When asked to simplify it, I paused and suggested using dynamic programming to store and reuse previous power calculations. He was satisfied with this approach.

He then asked if I knew about variable arguments and how to use them. I mentioned the Ellipse (…) operator and offered to write a prototype, stating I knew it theoretically. When asked how to access these variable arguments, I thought for a while and proposed some solutions. He was not satisfied with my response, so I admitted I didn't have much more knowledge on the topic, and the interview concluded. 25 out of 75 people were selected for the next round.

Round 4: HR Round

The HR representative was very friendly. I was the last candidate to be interviewed. She asked why I chose engineering, what inspires me, why I should be hired, and some questions about my family. She then inquired about my work location preference, and I stated Bangalore with a reason. She was satisfied. Ultimately, only 2 people were rejected.

How do you access variable arguments in C?