Alice & Bob Reviews

HR leadership wields far too much power in the company and is hellbent on imposing draconian policies that make no sense. For example, they won’t allow any salary negotiations, and want to have a say in minute details of company life (even on how research is conducted). Attempts to challenge these policies are stonewalled and the ensuing responses from HR leadership often range from uncomfortable to downright abusive. Over the last few months, several colleagues were fired without any satisfactory explanation and were basically “disappeared”. This naturally upset a large number of people and, for some, it eroded what little confidence they had in the department. The roadmap is overambitious and unrealistic — though to be honest that’s true of almost any company in the field. Some questionable technical decisions have contributed to our lagging behind competitors (notably Amazon). Salaries are below average in the field. This will limit the talent we’re able to bring in and could compromise the company goals. The bulk of the research team is hired from a handful of French academic groups. While everyone is certainly very capable and sharp, the lack of intellectual diversity is highly concerning. This also holds for our academic partnerships.

The ambition, fast growth, commitment to quality typical of a best in class deep-tech startup demand time and effort that other workplaces might not entail, It's somewhat of a price to pay when working on solving hard challenges.