UNIMAX LABORATORIES Interview Questions and Answers

Interview preparation tips for other job seekers - It is a very bad company.....no job security,. politics is everywhere in this company.

Round: Group Discussion
Experience: We were supposed to come up with a solution whether this subsidy cut should take place or not. Initially everyone was given 1 minute to speak, 12 people in the group and I was the 10th to speak, this gave me sufficient time to think but on the same hand I had to make sure that I say something which the 9 people before me haven’t spoken, so it was a bit tricky. After that the floor was open for discussion for 10 minutes, make it a point that this is not a debate so its not necessary that you take a positions for or against the topic, I had made points both in the favor of the issue and against it and it was appreciated by the moderators.

Round: Case Study Interview
Experience: I had to tell something about myself in not more than 45 seconds, so I focused more on my extra curricular activities and the volunteering work instead of academic achievements which I felt most of the other candidates too had a decent one.

Case: “Delhi airport has a terminal which is being utilized only upto 60% of its potential, still the authorities are planning to make a new terminal, what could be the reason behind it.” There can be numerous reasons to this, I gave a few good reasons and I was through. Like, the international flights are concentrated on a particular time of the day like at the night or early in the morning so during that time only one terminal might not be sufficient. Having more terminals would reduce the transit time and that will result in an efficient use of the runway and would smoothen the air traffic. I gave only these two reasons and tried to explain it in detail.

Round: Puzzle Interview
Experience: It was only me to whom a puzzle was asked and the interviewer assured me that he won't evaluate me on this. The puzzle was “there are 10 lions and a sheep on a lonely green island, sheep can eat grass and survive, lions can also survive on grass but that is they would like to do the least. Lions can eat the sheep but the catch is that which ever lion eats the sheep would turn into a sheep, now I am one of the lions so will I eat the sheep? Assume that all the lions are equally intelligent.” Although I had no clue how to solve this but I went ahead with the problem logically and the interviewer helped me, at the end I answered the question. There could be some tricky answers also to such questions which one should definitely say if you can think of any, like I said that “in the minds of all the lions there would be an element of fear for eating the sheep so I would think a step ahead and eat the sheep and the other lions
don't eat me due to this fear in their minds.”

Round: HR Interview
Experience: As soon as I entered the interviewer said “I remember you”, this was because we had some exchange of views during the ppt. In this round they made all the nine candidates solve the same case. It was about the truck industry in US, I was shown some data and graphs related to various business sectors in the industry and was asked to interpret things like why the profit margins are different in any two sectors, what would be the effect if a Japanese player comes in etc. To answer this having a basic knowledge of the terminologies would help a lot.

College Name: IIT KANPUR

Round: Resume Shortlist
Experience: On my own, with feedback from friends. Kept it simple, so that even a layman could understand what I've done in the various projects that I was involved in. It pays to be truthful, and yet, at the same time, to advertise one's achievements. In most of the interviews a random point on my resume was picked out and I was asked about it.

Round: Group Discussion
Experience: I did prepare in a group for the one day of case study prep that I did (and my other group member managed to get into BCG), so I guess it probably helps more than preparing alone.

Round: Puzzle Interview
Experience: Typical puzzles come coupled with recurrences which can in turn be coded into algorithms. See if you can get your hands on any of these.

Round: HR Interview
Experience: Interviews were puzzles based, plus algorithm/coding based. The puzzles weren't easy, but were doable with sufficient time. Two of my interviewers were happy to provide me with hints along the way and I kept telling them what I was thinking, no matter how naive it might be - for example, I'd give an exponential algorithm for a greedy/dynamic programming problem [if that's Greek and Latin to you you probably don't have a shot at Google!] and then tell them that it was a bad algorithm, and that I was trying for something better next. Typical minchange-optimal division type recurrence based algorithms were common, coupled with coding of the same algorithms [brushing up on coding skills helps!]. I was also asked questions on Operating Systems [some synchronization / TeX type questions], Cryptography and some puzzles based on simple intuition and mathematics.

Round: Other Interview
Experience: No Preparation. CSE BTech curriculum + common sense more than covers what one can be asked in the interview. It probably helps to be fresh with C++ syntax, however. Written test + 4 interviews (45 minutes each). 10 shortlisted at the end of the written test, 5 shortlisted at the end of the first two interviews, 4 (2 BTech, 2 MTech) made final offers.
Tips: Ideally, any BTech/DD from CSE should be well prepared without doing much, except probably practising coding. Algorithms: Greedy and Dynamic Programming crucial. Learn how to solve recurrences, if you don't know already. Don't know how important graph algos are, but searching, sorting are pretty important too. Brush up on these if you don't remember. Operating Systems: Synchronization

Skill Tips: Keep it cool with Google. Even a t-shirt is fine (they told me that - even though I was wearing a tie). Consulting interviews require the usual Shirt - Jacket - Tie combo. It helps to wear a jacket to hide the crumpled shirt inside. Smile!
College Name: IIT BOMBAY