Amazon | SDE-2 | India | January, 2021 | Reject
Anonymous User
959
Interview

Status: 3 years experience in backend development
Position: SDE-1 at a mid-size company
Location: Gurgaon, India
Date: January, 2021

  1. OA Round - AMCAT Test

    1. A variation of https://leetcode.com/problems/partition-labels/
    2. A variatioin of https://leetcode.com/problems/group-anagrams/

  2. Coding - 1 hr

    1. https://leetcode.com/problems/search-in-rotated-sorted-array/
    2. Given a binary tree, connect all the leaves in a doubly linked-list fashion. The leaves at the 2 ends of the binary tree should also be connected to each other.

  3. System Design - 1 hr

    1. Draw the HLD of the backend application you use (at work)
    2. Design a system where rising startups (clients) can use Amazon's Delivery Agent Network (DAN) to ship their products to customer. Product can be a food item (delivery should be quick), jewellery (safety is no. 1 priority) or any other consumer goods like chair, fridge, stationary etc.
      • The clients should be made aware of the delivery status at every stage (init, assigned to delivery agent, on the way, etc - think of all the statuses that can be there).
      • Some clients support cash-on-delivery (COD) as well.
      • The system should be optimized to choose a delivery agent from the DAN based on the client and type of product that is being shipped.

  4. System Design - 1 hr
    Amazon customers who have opted for COD should get notifications/SMS everyday on their phone to convert the order to pre-paid before it is delivered. Design a system that would enable this and keep track of the status of the payment (if made by the customer)

    • How will the delivery agents be made aware of payment if the customer has already paid a COD order?
    • Handle all the statuses of the payment (init, failed, success, etc).
    • How can you get more people to convert their orders to pre-paid? some COD orders might be of a very pricey product and thus would require highly trusted delivery agents(can be a problem) - how will you make sure that the customer converts it before delivery?

I was able to do the coding questions in time but I messed up a lot of stuff in the SD rounds which lead to rejection. I was mainly having trouble in collecting my thoughts and presenting them in an organized way.

A word of advice to whoever is interviewing right now - SD is as important as a coding round! Don't neglect it!

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