IIM Admission 2021: Mayank Shares His IIM Bangalore WAT-PI Experience

Mayank scored an overall percentile of 99.76 in CAT 2020 and subsequently converted IIM Bangalore call. He shares his WAT-PI experience with Shiksha. Read on.

Recalling his IIM Bangalore WAT-PI experience, Mayank, a BE degree holder from Jadavpur University in Electronics and Telecommunication Engineering says he faced a range of questions from his area of expertise and interest. The three Interview panellists grilled him on topics as diverse as semiconductor foundry business and Dan Brown’s Origin.

With an impressive academic record, work experience and 99.76 percentile in CAT 2020, Mayank was confident of getting interview calls from top IIMs.  Here he shares his WAT-PI experience at IIM Bangalore.

IIM Bangalore WAT Topic

Can Government schools be developed so that they can give quality education or such a case is not possible at all. (to be answered in 250 words)

My Answer

Wrote that this is completely possible if government provides proper funds and there are rigorous quality checks. The teachers recruited should be qualified enough, focus should be on holistic development and there should be proper infrastructure to enable these.

IIM Bangalore PI Experience

Panel - There were three panelists. Let’s call them P1, P2 and P3.

P1 - So you work for Samsung electronics, was it a conscious choice?

Me: I was interested in Digital Electronics during my UG and during internship drive, Samsung was the first company to offer this profile and I was selected there. At the end of my internship, I was offered PPO.

P1 - You have talked about 2 EoM award in your SoP, explain your contribution for that.

Me: 1^st was mainly for handling the customer. They did not have their architecture ready. I explained them the shortfalls of it. Provided them various approaches that can be taken with their pros and cons and thus helped them complete their architecture.

2^nd was completely technical. I was assigned to design the Power Architecture of Top Wrapper of an SoC. It was a huge task as I also had to collate Power Architecture of all sub-blocks and make sure that the combined design works. Also, I had not done any task of this scale before. However, I learned all the relevant topics in no time and delivered the task within deadline with great quality.

P1 - Explain the semiconductor foundry business.

Me: A Semiconductor foundry manufactures chips for inhouse products, if the firm has any or for other customers. These customers are divided into various categories based on the architecture that they have developed before approaching the foundry. If they have a complete and validated architecture, it directly goes to fabrication lab for manufacturing, otherwise it comes to design team and they design and validate it on behalf of the customer.

P1 - Which is the biggest company in this field?

Me: TSMC (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company)

P1 - What went wrong for intel?

Me: They have taken a lot of time to shift to lower nodes. They’re still using 10nm technology while others have shifted to 5nm. Also, they announced in 2016 that they will shift to 7nm but this plan has been delayed to 2022 now.

P1 - What could be the two major reasons for that?

Me: 1^st could be not able to design a stable architecture for lower nodes.

2^nd could be cost. As, Intel has most of its fabrication labs in US and US is a costly country whereas countries such as Taiwan as much cheaper.

P1 - Where do you see semiconductor industry after 10-15 years?

Me: It is going to grow exponentially. Use of customised chip in increasing each day with advance in IoT and AI technology.

P1 - What is this shortage going on?

Me: There has been exponential increase in demand for SoCs for automobiles in recent years. And when this COVID pandemic started, foundries across the globe reduced their production or completely halted it. These 2 factors together created acute shortage of SoCs.

P1 - But how are mobile companies getting their chips on time but not automobile companies?

Me: Mobile companies have been using SoCs for long, they’re the permanent customers and foundries are aware of their demand whereas usage of SoCs in automobile has become significant in recent years. If we look at output of TSMC, 48% of it goes to Mobile companies whereas just 3% of it goes to automobile companies.

P1 - So the automotive chip share is less, that means fabs shouldn't care about them (smiling)

Me: No Sir, I believe fabs are working their best to increase the production capacity and chips should be available in abundance in coming 1-1.5 years.

P1 - So, you're good at what you're doing, why do you want to do MBA?

Me: I am interested in electronics but only technology is not sufficient to make an electronic product successful, there are many business aspects as well. With my bachelors and work exp till date I have got acquainted with technological side and now I want to gain knowledge of business side.

P2 - Tell me something about PLI schemes.

Me: PLI stands for Production linked incentive scheme, its objective is to give incentive to companies for products manufactured in domestic units. The Union Government has identified its importance and has allotted a large chunk of fund in recent budget. Also, I believe semiconductor sector should get such incentives and government should facilitate setting up of fabrication labs.

P1 (again) - but it will be costly affair, how it would be done in India?

Me: It will be a costly affair but if It is done then it will be a huge benefit for India in terms of revenue and job creation considering the demand in current scenario.

P2 - Explain two of your weakness.

Me:I say things as they are and don’t euphemise, this sometimes come around as a rude behaviour.

Wishful thinking – Sometimes I make elaborate plans and have lots of expectations from it but it becomes saddening when the plan and outcome doesn’t materialise as expected.

P3 - So I heard all that boring Semiconductor talk, what do you want to do after MBA?

Me: I want to go in Product Management, preferably in a technology firm.

P3 – But you can get to that position by continuing your job also.

Me I can but going through MBA is less time consuming.

P3 - What are the roles of a product manager?

Me: Roles of a Product Manager is not clearly defined. However, it includes taking care of conceptualisation of product, its R&D, marketing, sales and also taking care of related finances.

P2 - Given a process, how would you implement it? Using hardware or software approach?

Me: I will use a hybrid approach i.e., using an optimised hardware and software. Using a generic hardware or software will result into wastage of resources as some parts of them might not be used.

P3 - What are your hobbies?

Me: I enjoy reading, mostly fiction and I am Dan Brown fan.

P3 - What was the last book by him?

Me: Origin

P3 – In that book an AI takes decision to murder a person, do you think there can be a scenario where AI takes decision to kill someone?

Me: If there are proper failsafe in the algorithms then I don’t think such a scenario can arise.

P3 - I don't want to know how it can be prevented, tell me how it can happen?

Me: AI is being developed be used in case of judiciary, it is being said that roles of lawyers can be substituted with AI. So, in that case an AI can take decision on killing a culprit.

P3 - Okay, you can log off, Thank you

It was a long interview but I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Verdict – Converted.

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