I applied through a recruiter. I interviewed at Kalepa (Paris) in May 2025
Interview
I applied for the Machine Learning Engineer role at Kalepa. The process began with a pre-screening interview with a recruiter.
The second stage was a coding interview, conducted via IDE. I successfully solved the task within the allotted time, explained my approach clearly and wrote tests.
Despite completing the challenge, I was not invited to the next stage of the process and I was not provided with specific feedback.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Leetcode medium question about matrix transformation
I applied online. The process took 1 week. I interviewed at Kalepa (New York, NY) in Mar 2025
Interview
I completed three stages of the interview process. It started with a simple HackerRank test—nothing unusual—followed by an HR screening and a technical interview. Both interviews were smooth and very friendly.
I had a longer interview with a staff software engineer, which I found very enjoyable. It felt more like a discussion with a friend or colleague rather than a formal interview. I was hoping they would give me an offline task rather than an online one since I don't perform well in exam-like settings.
Overall, it was a great experience. They emphasize not being a typical 9-to-5 workplace, which I think is the best approach for startups! I also appreciate that they set clear expectations from the start regarding the level of effort required, rather than surprising candidates after hiring.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
The interview focused on system design, problem-solving, database issues, and past experiences. There was also a LeetCode-style question, likely at a medium difficulty level. (I’m not a fan of LeetCode.)
I applied online. The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at Kalepa in Oct 2024
Interview
Received a 75 minute code screen through HackerRank as the first step, which I completed on time and mostly correctly (did not fully complete the last problem). I was sent a boiler plate rejection the next day. Waste of time.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Write code to calculate maximum profit over a few days of single stock prices, extract information from JSON output from an API, find index of first occurrence of a character in a string.