I was referred through one of the company official to apply directly to their online openings. When I submitted my resume I got an automated email to finish a challenge which had few hardware design questions about spacecraft. I finished the weekly challenge within just 2 days and sent them. I was waiting to hear back within 2 weeks as described by the HR person. After 2 weeks they sent me email saying they lost a bunch of challenge answers but they do have my copy. I send them my copy again just to make sure they don't lose it again. Within couple more weeks on a Monday morning, I was asked by the HR person to setup a phone interview. Around the same time I got another email from spire (not from HR) stating that, they were moving with another candidate. When I asked the HR person, why there are so much confusion, she replied, the senior engineer made an offer to a person "over the weekend" who had a similar background as mine and now they have decided to hire only "senior level engineers"; but because they are impressed with my challenge answers they would like to get back to me within few months." The real job posting at the time I applied (even now I checked) didn't mention anything about the level of engineer that they are looking for. If they would explicitly say, they are looking for senior level engineers I would save my time by- not applying, finishing the challenge problems and waiting. What I understood, they have a lack of communication between different departments, the senior hiring manager is allowed to make decision almost abruptly without informing others and the HR person tried to be nice to make up for the confusion.

A recruiter from Spire got in touch with me via Linkedin and invited me to apply for the role. After an initial screening, I was invited to a technical interview with a senior engineer. Following this, I was invited to 4 further interviews with various members of the engineering team. These interviews were billed as "values" based, but turned out to be more technical focused, with many of the questions being repeated between interviewers. I then presented a high level solution to a design challenge that I had been given prior to the 4 interviews, and took questions on my solution. After this, I was invited to another technical interview, as supposedly one of the interviewers hadnt asked all the technical questions they wanted to. In said interview wasnt asked anything I hadnt already been asked prior. I was then invited to a meeting with one of the directors of the company, which lasted 20 minutes and was just a couple of values based questions. All in all this process took approximately 3 weeks. I got a response a week after this, to say that while they think id be a good fit in the company, my experience with Altium as opposed to the other pcb design packages I have used in the past, wasnt up to scratch and they dont have time to accomodate me getting up to speed with it. This was a bit frustrating as that was discussed in the very first technical interview (and then repeatedly afterwards) and if it was such an issue, they couldve saved us both time by not taking the interview process any further. Additionaly, the technical manager had spoken a good game about how they encourage learning and development withtin their environment. He did however let slip about people not switching off from communications outside of office hours, and then tried to retract and play it down, so perhaps they mean that they encourage it entirely in your own time and not on theirs? That would fit in with not having time to accomodate a new start getting up to speed with a software package.