Bionaut Labs interview questions

Strange experience with a recent interview at Bionaut Labs. I submitted my resume and got a response very quickly. We set up an interview with a technical manager, which went fairly well. As a result, I was given a task: to design a microbot propulsion and control system inside an animal or human. Apparently, this is common in their interview process. The technical field was a bit outside of what I normally deal with, so I spent a few days on research to come up with the slides they requested. They liked what I produced, and I was invited for in-person interviews. I was supposed to make a presentation and have several meetings up to the CEO level. It seemed like things were going pretty smoothly. When I showed up at the Bionaut facility for the interviews, the vibe was still generally positive. Quite a few people showed up for the presentation, they appeared friendly and interested in what I had to say. As I was going through my slides, people asked reasonable questions, to which I responded. Halfway through the presentation, the CEO showed up and started quizzing me on memorizing formulas, as if this was the most important part of the job. When he did not get the answer he was looking for, I was essentially kicked out, with the rest of the interviews cancelled. Admittedly, I was probably not the ideal fit for the position - but that should have been apparent from the initial interview and my resume. Why go through all this charade and waste my time? The CEO's behavior strikes me as arrogant, disrespectful, and unprofessional. He probably could not even be bothered to look at my resume prior to showing up at the presentation.

Initial interview with senior staff, followed by an assignment with presentation to the team. The assignment was not aimed at getting a "right" answer, more aimed to drive a discussion about the process you followed and the "why" of certain design decisions.