At NetCom Group S.p.A., a Software Engineer is a pivotal contributor to high-stakes engineering projects, particularly within the aerospace and avionics sectors. You will be responsible for the full software development lifecycle, ranging from rigorous requirements definition and design to implementation, integration, and performance analysis. Your work directly impacts the reliability and functionality of flight software and complex hardware-integrated systems. This role is both technically demanding and strategically significant. You will often work at the intersection of software and physical hardware, requiring a deep understanding of real-time constraints and multi-threaded applications. Whether you are developing digital twins, simulators, or core flight logic, your contributions enable NetCom Group S.p.A. to maintain its leadership in engineering consultancy. It is a role designed for engineers who thrive on precision, system-level architecture, and the challenge of building software that must perform flawlessly in mission-critical environments.
Initial Screening
reportedConducted via telephone or video call to assess your background, communication skills, and alignment with the role.
What to demonstrate
- Conducted via telephone or video call to assess your background, communication skills, and alignment with the role
- Depth in C
How to prepare
- Be able to walk your CV end to end in two minutes, and say why this company specifically.
- Have your salary expectations, notice period and location constraints ready, and ask for the rest of the loop in writing.
Technical Interviews
reportedOne or more sessions focused on the technologies listed in your resume and your practical ability to solve engineering challenges.
What to demonstrate
- One or more sessions focused on the technologies listed in your resume and your practical ability to solve engineering challenges
- Depth in C
How to prepare
- Answer aloud and timed: Describe your experience with RTOS (Real-Time Operating Systems) and multi-threading challenges.
- Answer aloud and timed: How would you troubleshoot a communication failure in a protocol like CAN or SPI?
PracHub editorial advice for the preparation topics above.
Own your resume
Every technology or project you list is fair game for deep questioning. Be prepared to explain your specific contributions in detail.
Master the basics
While we discuss advanced systems, ensure your fundamental coding skills are sharp, as these are often tested to verify your baseline capability.
Focus on the "why
When explaining technical decisions, don't just state what you did; explain the trade-offs you considered and why you chose your specific path.
Prepare for international interaction
Since the team is global, demonstrate that you can communicate technical concepts clearly and concisely in English.
Choose a category, try a prompt, then open its approach, worked solution or follow-up when you need it.
How do you manage memory allocation in a real-time environment?
How do you manage memory allocation in a real-time environment?
Approach
- Say what the runtime actually does before reasoning about the code.
- Name what is shared across threads and what owns each piece of state.
- Identify the window where an invariant is briefly untrue.
- Distinguish a value from a reference to it, and say which one you handed out.
Follow-up
- What happens if two callers reach this at the same time?
- Where could this allocate more than you expect?
Write a function to determine if a given integer x is a palindrome.
Write a function to determine if a given integer x is a palindrome.
Approach
- Restate the input: its shape, its size, and what is guaranteed about it.
- Name the brute-force solution and its complexity before improving on it.
- Choose the data structure from the access pattern, not from familiarity.
- State the target complexity and say which constraint rules the naive version out.
Follow-up
- How does this change if the input no longer fits in memory?
- What is the worst case, and how likely is it on real data?
How do you optimize a piece of code that is consuming too much CPU in a real-time loop?
How do you optimize a piece of code that is consuming too much CPU in a real-time loop?
Approach
- Restate the input: its shape, its size, and what is guaranteed about it.
- Name the brute-force solution and its complexity before improving on it.
- Choose the data structure from the access pattern, not from familiarity.
- State the target complexity and say which constraint rules the naive version out.
Follow-up
- How does this change if the input no longer fits in memory?
- What is the worst case, and how likely is it on real data?
Explain why the owner filter ignores the listing index
The only index on resource is (tenant_id, status, updated_at DESC, resource_id DESC). A new endpoint returns one user's resources across all statuses, newest created first: WHERE tenant_id = $1 AND owner_user_id = $2 ORDER BY created_at DESC LIMIT 20. On a tenant with 2M rows it takes 900 ms and EXPLAIN shows a sort above a large scan. Explain precisely why the existing index cannot serve it, give the index that can, and state which of these the new index still will not help: owner_user_id alone across tenants; the same query ordered by updated_at. PostgreSQL 16.
Approach
- Separate the two jobs an index does. For filtering, a composite btree is seekable only on a left prefix, so with no predicate on status the scan can at best range over tenant_id and test owner_user_id per row; PostgreSQL 16 has no btree skip scan to jump the unconstrained column.
- For ordering, the index is sorted by (status, updated_at) within a tenant and not by created_at, so the LIMIT cannot stop early: every matching row is read and then sorted. That is the 'Sort Method: top-N heapsort' line, and it is why the plan reads 2M rows to answer with 20.
- Derive the replacement from the access path — equality, equality, then the ordering column: CREATE INDEX CONCURRENTLY ON resource (tenant_id, owner_user_id, created_at DESC). The scan seeks to the (tenant, owner) range and walks 20 entries in order, so the Sort node disappears along with the row-read.
- Treat INCLUDE (title, status) as conditional, not free. An index-only scan still visits the heap for any row whose page is not marked all-visible, so on a table taking 1.2k writes/second the win depends on autovacuum keeping the visibility map current, and the wider index costs more on every insert.
Follow-up
- 90% of rows are status='active'. Would a partial index WHERE status = 'active' change your answer, and for which of the three queries?
- A dashboard runs this for 40 owners in one page load. What changes about the design?
Stop tag and share joins from fanning out a page
resource_tag is (resource_id, tag_id) with PK (resource_id, tag_id); resource_share is (resource_id, shared_with_user_id, permission). The tagged-and-shared listing inner-joins resource to both, filters tenant_id, tag_id = ANY($2) and shared_with_user_id = $3, orders by updated_at DESC and takes 50. Pages come back with fewer than 50 distinct resources and the total in the header is far too high. Explain the row multiplication, rewrite both the page query and the count query so each is correct, and name the index each one needs. PostgreSQL 16.
Approach
- Do the arithmetic against the predicates that are actually there. An inner join emits one row per matching child row, and both joins are filtered: tag_id = ANY($2) admits only the requested tags, shared_with_user_id = $3 admits one user's share rows. So a resource holding three of the requested tags and shared with $3 once yields three rows, not one — the multiplier is its count of matching tags times its share rows for that single user, and that second factor is 1 unless the table admits duplicate (resource_id, shared_with_user_id) pairs. LIMIT 50 then limits rows rather than resources, and COUNT(*) counts pairs — the header is the product, not the population.
- Reject DISTINCT as the fix. It deduplicates after the product has been built, so the planner must materialise and sort the fanned-out set before the LIMIT can apply, and it leaves any SUM or AVG in the same select list wrong.
- Rewrite both filters as semi-joins, keeping resource as the only row source: AND EXISTS (SELECT 1 FROM resource_tag rt WHERE rt.resource_id = r.resource_id AND rt.tag_id = ANY($2)) and the same shape against resource_share. A semi-join stops at the first match per resource and preserves the driving index order, so ORDER BY updated_at DESC, resource_id DESC LIMIT 50 still stops after 50 rows.
- Count with the same predicates and no join at all: SELECT count(*) FROM resource r WHERE r.tenant_id = $1 AND r.status = 'active' AND EXISTS (...) AND EXISTS (...). Nothing multiplies a resource, so the number is the population.
Follow-up
- The filter changes from 'any of these tags' to 'all of these tags'. Rewrite it and state what it costs relative to the ANY form.
- A resource can be shared with the same user twice under different permissions. Does your count change, and should it?
Explain the differences between C and C++ in the context of embedded systems.
Explain the differences between C and C++ in the context of embedded systems.
Approach
- Clarify what is being asked and what a complete answer contains.
- State your assumptions explicitly before working the problem.
- Say what you would check first and why it is the highest-information step.
- Work from the requirement backwards to the design.
Follow-up
- What assumption would you test first?
- How would you know your answer was wrong?
What is the role of a digital twin in the software testing phase?
What is the role of a digital twin in the software testing phase?
Approach
- Clarify what is being asked and what a complete answer contains.
- State your assumptions explicitly before working the problem.
- Say what you would check first and why it is the highest-information step.
- Work from the requirement backwards to the design.
Follow-up
- What assumption would you test first?
- How would you know your answer was wrong?
Given a specific hardware constraint, how would you adapt your software architecture?
Given a specific hardware constraint, how would you adapt your software architecture?
Approach
- Fix the scope first: who calls this, how often, and what they do when it fails.
- Name the read and write paths separately; they rarely have the same bottleneck.
- Choose a partition key and say what query it makes expensive.
- State the consistency you need, and where you are willing to be stale.
Follow-up
- What breaks first when traffic grows ten times?
- How does this behave when that dependency is down for an hour?
How would you troubleshoot a communication failure in a protocol like CAN or SPI?
How would you troubleshoot a communication failure in a protocol like CAN or SPI?
Approach
- Establish what changed and when, before forming any theory.
- Pick a bisection that eliminates candidates whichever way it turns out.
- Check the instrumentation before believing the symptom.
- Separate the trigger from the cause; the deploy is rarely the bug.
Follow-up
- What would you look at first, and what would it rule out?
- How would you tell a cause from a coincidence here?
Built from the rounds and topics NetCom Group S.p.A. candidates report.
Prepare, practise & reflect
One practical outcome each day. Spend longer where you need it.
0 / 7 done01Map the NetCom Group S.p.A. loop
- Write out the reported sequence: Initial Screening, Technical Interviews.
- For each round, write one sentence on what it is judging, from the description above, and mark the one you are least ready for.
Deliverable: A one-page map of the 2 reported rounds, with the weakest marked.
02Work C
- Spend the session on C, which NetCom Group S.p.A. candidates report being tested on.
- Write one worked example in C and time yourself on it.
Deliverable: One timed worked example in C.
03Work C++
- Spend the session on C++, which NetCom Group S.p.A. candidates report being tested on.
- Write one worked example in C++ and time yourself on it.
Deliverable: One timed worked example in C++.
04Work Real-Time Operating Systems (RTOS)
- Spend the session on Real-Time Operating Systems (RTOS), which NetCom Group S.p.A. candidates report being tested on.
- Write one worked example in Real-Time Operating Systems (RTOS) and time yourself on it.
Deliverable: One timed worked example in Real-Time Operating Systems (RTOS).
05Answer out loud: Technical & Domain Knowledge
- Answer aloud, timed: Explain the differences between C and C++ in the context of embedded systems.
- Answer aloud, timed: How do you manage memory allocation in a real-time environment?
Deliverable: Spoken answers to 2 reported Technical & Domain Knowledge question(s), under time.
06Answer out loud: Coding & Problem Solving
- Answer aloud, timed: Write a function to determine if a given integer x is a palindrome.
- Answer aloud, timed: How do you optimize a piece of code that is consuming too much CPU in a real-time loop?
Deliverable: Spoken answers to 2 reported Coding & Problem Solving question(s), under time.
07Dry run for NetCom Group S.p.A.
- Run one full mock under time, then write down the two questions you most want to ask your interviewers.
Deliverable: A completed timed mock and two questions to ask.
Expand any day for tasks and deliverables. Your progress is saved on this device.
Behavioural rounds judge the decision you made and what it cost.
Describe your experience with RTOS (Real-Time Operating Systems) and multi-threading challenges.
Describe your experience with RTOS (Real-Time Operating Systems) and multi-threading challenges.
Approach
- Pick a story where you made the decision, not one where you watched it.
- State the situation in two sentences and spend the rest on the reasoning.
- Give the blast radius: what could have broken, and what you measured.
- Name the disagreement and how you resolved it with evidence.
Follow-up
- What would you do differently if you ran that again?
- How did you know your change caused the improvement?
Argue against a design, lose, and commit anyway
Describe a design you argued against and lost. State the failure you predicted as a named mechanism, not a feeling about complexity: two services that would need one transaction, a projection with no rebuild path, a write path with no idempotency key. Say what evidence you brought, what the decision maker weighed instead, and what you did after the decision was made: what you instrumented, what you wrote down, and whether the prediction came true. Five minutes.
Approach
- State the prediction in falsifiable form up front: the mechanism, the condition that triggers it, and the observable outcome. A prediction that cannot be checked also cannot be credited to you later.
- Show the evidence you had at the time and label each piece honestly as measured, analogous, or intuition. Keeping the intuition is fine; disguising it as data is the thing that erodes your standing in the next argument.
- Represent the opposing case at full strength, including the constraint you did not control: a fixed date, a team boundary, or the fact that the decision was cheap to reverse and yours was not.
- Make disagree-and-commit concrete. Name the artefact you left behind so the prediction could be settled without you: the alert and its threshold, the counter on the dashboard, the decision note that recorded the trade-off and the condition that would revisit it.
Follow-up
- What threshold on that alert would have proved you right, and did anyone ever look at it?
- If the same proposal arrived tomorrow with the same deadline, would you argue it the same way?
Tell callers you do not own that their integration breaks
A field in a write endpoint's response must change shape. You own the endpoint; you do not own the four internal callers or the outbound webhook consumers who read it. Describe a deprecation you were responsible for: what you shipped first, how you established who was actually reading the field, the window you gave and what set its length, what you did about the consumer who never moved, and how you decided removal was safe. Name the signal you used, not the announcement you sent.
Approach
- Establish the reader set empirically rather than from a wiki of owners: per-field usage counters keyed by principal, or access logs attributed to a consumer. State the blind spot of whichever you pick, since a consumer that reads the field only on a monthly job will not appear in a week of logs.
- Ship additive first. Populate the new field alongside the old one so no reader is forced to move, which is also what keeps a rolling deploy safe, because old and new instances answer the same requests at the same time and a rollback must still find the old shape present.
- Set the window from the slowest legitimate consumer's release cadence, not from your calendar, and decide separately what to do for a consumer with no release process at all, such as an external webhook endpoint you can only email.
- Convert silence into evidence before you rely on it: a short, low-traffic removal window that makes a still-dependent consumer fail visibly and loudly while you are watching, rather than at three in the morning after you have moved on.
Follow-up
- How would you detect a consumer that reads the field only during a monthly export?
- One caller refuses to move and has a commercial relationship behind it. What changes in your plan and what does not?
- 01
Describe your experience with RTOS (Real-Time Operating Systems) and multi-threading challenges.
- 02
Describe a design you argued against and lost. State the failure you predicted as a named mechanism, not a feeling about complexity: two services that would need one transaction, a projection with no rebuild path, a write path with no idempotency key. Say what evidence you brought, what the decision maker weighed instead, and what you did after the decision was made: what you instrumented, what you wrote down, and whether the prediction came true. Five minutes.
- 03
A field in a write endpoint's response must change shape. You own the endpoint; you do not own the four internal callers or the outbound webhook consumers who read it. Describe a deprecation you were responsible for: what you shipped first, how you established who was actually reading the field, the window you gave and what set its length, what you did about the consumer who never moved, and how you decided removal was safe. Name the signal you used, not the announcement you sent.
How long does the interview process typically take?
The process is designed to be swift and professional, generally moving from the initial screening to a decision within a few weeks. We value your time and aim to provide timely updates throughout your candidacy.
NetCom Group S.p.A. Software Engineer candidate reports ↗Is the technical interview focused on theoretical knowledge or practical application?
The focus is heavily on practical application. Expect questions that test your ability to apply your knowledge to real-world problems, such as coding challenges or explaining how you have solved specific technical hurdles in past projects.
NetCom Group S.p.A. Software Engineer candidate reports ↗What is the culture like at NetCom Group S.p.A.?
We are a Società Benefit that prioritizes the well-being of our people and professional growth. We foster a collaborative, inclusive environment where individual contributions are respected and encouraged.
NetCom Group S.p.A. Software Engineer candidate reports ↗How hard is the NetCom Group S.p.A. interview?
Candidates most commonly rate NetCom Group S.p.A.
NetCom Group S.p.A. Software Engineer candidate reports ↗What topics does NetCom Group S.p.A. test in interviews?
NetCom Group S.p.A. interviews most often cover Interview Process Management, Problem Solving, C, Marketing Analytics, and Inside Sales. The exact emphasis depends on the specific role you apply for.
NetCom Group S.p.A. Software Engineer candidate reports ↗Sources & methodology 3 sources ↗
No official company page is cited. Rounds and questions come from candidate reports and PracHub editorial material; each source shows the date it was read.
- 01NetCom Group S.p.A. Software Engineer candidate reports ↗
Company-reported rounds, questions and FAQ.
Candidate reports · Accessed 2026-09-22 - 02PracHub Software Engineer practice ↗
PracHub practice material, not company-reported.
PracHub page · Accessed 2026-09-22 - 03PracHub preparation framework ↗
PracHub preparation guidance.
PracHub page · Accessed 2026-09-22
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