I have been gone through initial screen for software engineer role (simulation). 10+ yoe. Any idea about culture and compensation?? here are my thoughts: Aurora: That is my top pick becasue of their impressive leadership team. BUT VW and now Hyundai left them after worki g with them about an year. This looks really BAD that they are not able to retain partners and they prefer to go and invest somewhere else. Plus their offers in terms of stock I heard is pretty low since they are selling minimum 10x growth in 1-2 years which i dont buy. i cleared phone screening but delaying onsite. anyone has any comments/opinion about Aurora??? please help. Argo: They have so much money. Recent offers i know are 30 to 50% above their current compensation. plus they have very solid backing of Ford and VW. Aptiv: It is already 20bn market cap. Does not attract me in terms of growth potential. but they were able to impress Hyundai to invet 4bn in them which is huge. Cruise: No way. i already told recruiter i am not interested. Heard bad feedback from a friend who works there. TC: 450+ (in Pittsburgh)
Waymo :)
Problem with stock liquidity since they don’t give google stocks. Plus they are already valued really high, growth potential not very attractive.
Argo is pretty great 🤷🏻♂️
Argo would be my choice if you leave Uber. Just curious, did you consider Lyft L5?
I had offer from them last year rejected it already. Met with Anantha and other leadership team - they were great people but I just did not believed that they have technical background to solve self driving problem.
Exactly same for me; I had an offer last year and didn’t take it. TC was fine but I didn’t get the best vibe during interview. I interviewed with Argo (Perception team) and liked that team much more than Lyft.
I'd recommend getting through all on-sites and seeing what your choices come down to. I obviously recommend Aurora, but I'm biased. The tech anywhere is at an early enough stage that everyone's hedging their bets - that's what we're seeing here. Hyundai remains partner to Aurora, but has also started a partnership with Aptiv (they started something with Yandex earlier this year too). We at Aurora aren't too worried, remain motivated and are continuing to make solid progress.
Thanks! Great to hear someone from Aurora. But you don’t make an investment worth $4bn until you have great confidence in their technology stack. I don’t know exactly how much Hyundai investment into Aurora but prolly fraction of that amount.
Agreed - I don't doubt that Aptiv has some good stuff to show, and good talent to offer. Hyundai was and is a minority investor in Aurora. I don't know the terms of their JV. It sounds like it's valued at 4bn, with Hyundai putting in 1.6bn. I don't know how much stake they get in return - but it seems like it's quite high (compared to valuations in this industry). I'd love to hear what people from Aptiv think about the deal.
Aurora is still partnered with FCA and Amazon. I don’t think it’s BAD at all. They still have a strong leadership and there are so many companies out there to be partnered with in the future. VW and Hyundai probably pulled out because they didn’t have the same goals aligned which is understandable in this industry because it’s still fairly new. Argo is promising too. Same business model as Aurora where they just want to build the software and partner with OEMs. I don’t think you can go wrong with either tbh.
Seems like people mentioned Aptiv here and there but no one really comes to interview.
Yeah, I got a call for Aptiv too for a role in Michigan but I declined. Somehow, doesn't give the feeling of much growth potential.
Apply for Boston/Pittsburgh/Singapore, it is very different from Michigan.
Why you leave uber? How is pittsburgh? Your TC is a lot in Pittsburgh.
I heard disturbing stories about Jinnah who is leading the software org at Aurora. I saw that in Blind someone commented which I ignored but then I met someone who worked under Jinnah in past and he mentioned he is an asshole (before you ask me what do I mean by that please read Robert Sutton book about Asshole). Can someone comment from Aurora on how was their experience with Jinnah???? I am worried if that is case with top leadership then it can have trickled down effect.
No negative experience as such. I have also heard good things from others who have worked with him at previous places. At least in my experience so far, work culture is among the top things that employees rate highly at Aurora. I don't think you should have too much reason for concern.
Thanks!
Where’d you read that Hyundai dropped Aurora?
Just announced two days ago. They invested 4bn with Aptiv and it implies that they won’t proceed with Aurora.