Cadence Design Systems Hardware Engineer Interview Questions and Answers

Round: Test
Experience: Questions were from digital Electronics which included realization of counters using JK FF,Sequence detector,Boolean expression reduction,One shot and drawing waveforms of some digital circuits.Questions were also their from pipelinig,finding out MIPS,power consumption of two processors,Small signal analysis of MOSFETs,Buffer using CMOS ,finding out the type of filter given block diagram(control theory).Questions were easy and required step by step realization.
Tips: Prepare digital Electronics very well as it has 50% weightage in paper. Pipelinig is important. Some basics concepts of CMOS is very necessary.
Duration: 1hr 15 min minute
Total Questions: 12

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: First they asked to introduce yourself.
Then they asked about projects & Internship.
STA,EEPROM,EPROM,DRAM,SRAM,CACHE Memory,Pipelining,DMA was asked in depth.
Difference between clock skew and Jitter.
Asked whether I know any Hardware Languages.
XOR gate using 2:1 MUX.
Gave a waveform,had to realize using DFF and considering the delay.
Tips: Study STA very well.
Questions will be asked in depth from any topic.

Round: HR Interview
Experience: Family Background
Why NXP
Hobbies


Skill Tips: Study Digital Electronics very well
Skills: Analog Electronics, Microprocessor, Vlsi Basics, Digital Circuits
College Name: BIT Mesra

Round: Test
Experience: Questions were from Digital Electronics,Microprocessors and some from CMOS.
50% Digital Electronics.
1 X Output waveform drawing from circuit of FFs & gates
1 X Realize inverter from given two blocks
1 X CMOS implementation of gates
1 X Realize digital circuit for given waveform
1 X MIPS & Pipelining
1 X Processors power Dissipation calculation
1 X Small Signal analysis of CMOS
1 X Compare two given buffers circuits(CMOS)
1 X Transfer function calculation(Control Theory)
1 X Counter using JK FF
1 X Sequence Detector

Tips: Study digital electronics very well.

Duration: 1 hr 45 min minute
Total Questions: 12

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: Indroduction
Projects & Internship
Discussions in DEPTH on:
Pipelining
STA
MIPS
Memory(flash memory,DRAM,SRAM)
CACHE Memory
DMA
Digital circuit realization for given waveform
XOR Gate using 2:1 MUX
Tips: Prepare Digital electronics and Microprocessors very well.Sta is very important.Panel will go deep into the topics to check ur technical knowledge.
TIPS: Be confident and your opinion should be strong.Stand by what you say.Do not get confused.And when panel asks to solve any digital circuits, speak loud what is in your mind and what approach you are using.Be honest.

Round: HR Interview
Experience: Family Background
Why Freescale


Skills: Static Timing Analysis (STA), Memory, CMOS Circuits, Microprocessor, Digital Circuits
College Name: BIT Mesra
Motivation: I had interest in core electronics

Round: Resume Shortlist
Experience: Resume is not given any due importance in selection for further rounds . But honesty is very important as it counts once you are selected for HR round .
Tips: Try to be one hundred percent honest . And put your projects and course work in the beginning. They don't care your POR s and extra curricular activities.

Round: Test
Experience: Hardware - Questions are mainly from ELECTRICAL CIRCUITS (RLC ckts) , Analog ckts. Amplifiers , Opamps , digital system design . Aptitude section is very easy . Hardware section is tough .I felt Signal processing was easier , indeed I got selected for that profile .
Tips: Prepare thoroughly these courses :- EMC , DIGITAL SYSTEMS, NETWORKS AND SYSTEMS,ANALOG & DIGITAL SIGNAL PROCESSING , ANALOG CKTS COURSES .THAT SHOULD BE ENOUGH .
Duration: 90 - Signal Processing minutes
Total Questions: 120 - Hardware and aptitude

Round: Group Discussion
Experience: No
Tips: No

Duration: 2
College Name: IIT Madras

Round: Test
Experience: Test was subjective and questions were asked from basic analog, digital design, VHDL and VLSI circuits.

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: Had 3 technical interviews each around 25 minutes. They asked me about my summer internship and
questions from microcontroller architecture and its interfacing. Then they asked me the questions
from those problems which I didn't attempt in the written test.
Tips: For electrical students, it might be a bit challenging. I took an elective on Microcontroller in 7th sem which
helped me a lot during the interview. You might want to brush up your concepts of 8085, digital, OPAMPs
and analog

Round: HR Interview
Experience: My family background and my future goals were asked. They asked me about
my internship project and wanted to know what I learnt during the internship. Then I asked a few questions
from them about the company work culture and growth opportunities

College Name: IIT Roorkee

Round: Test
Total Questions: 15

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: Panel discussed questions attempted incorrectly or not attempted. Topics asked separately: RAM, MOSFET, Memory, Interrupts, FIFO etc.Few puzzles were also asked.

General Tips: Topics that should be covered: Digital Electronics, Microprocessors, Basic Electronics, K Map and FSM questions.
Skills:
College Name: BIT MESRA

Round: Test
Experience: The selection procedure is a test followed by tech interview and an HR interview.
The test had two parts:
 Aptitude (common across all profiles)
 A tech. test (separate for each profile)

Round: Interview
Experience: The tech interview was the important one and the HR interview was just about knowing the student and vice-versa. The tech interview was more concentrated on the basics and more importance was given to the approach of solving the problem rather than solving the problem itself.
No CGPA cutoff.

Round: Interview
Experience: Not very important.

General Tips: The work is well structured and executed. There is a lot of opportunity for more technical learning. Interns are also included into the teams and this helps the intern on knowing about the things going around them and gets an overall view of how things work.
As a whole, the work is very good, and exceeds all the expectations of the students.
College Name: IIT Madras

Round: Technical Interview
Experience: They asked me about my thesis and some device related questions as my thesis was on modelling of device. Questions were basic and were related to variation of device parameters with environmental factors and other parameters. Apart from that, several questions related to basic digital circuits were also asked concerning flip flops, latches, setup time and hold time. The technical interview went on for approximately 1 hour.

Round: HR Interview
Experience: The HR round lasted for about 5 mins only. The HR person asked me whether I were interested in going for PhD or not and about my hobbies and interests. Overall, the interviewers are very friendly and asked basic questions only.
Tips: Prepare your CV well, have a good CPI, do your thesis sincerely, concentrate on your basics and you will stand a very good chance of getting selected.


General Tips: Do the courses thoroughly, make good course projects and start preparing for the placement session at least 1 month early.

Don’t ever mention to them that you are interested in higher studies even if you are applying. In case you don’t get a job at your targeted company, don’t lose hope and move on to the next one.

Concentrate on your preparation and the things that are of utmost importance, don’t get bogged down by pressure. Be optimistic and cheerful, because confidence really helps during interviews.

Final Tips :
1. Be confident and enthusiastic in your response to questions because you have to make them understand that you are interested in the profile.
2. Chalk out a plan to strengthen your strong points and address the weak ones.

College Name: IIT Kanpur