Joel Clarke was Exploding Phone’s first ever University placement student. Having now completed his degree at Brunel University he has come back to the fold as a fully-fledged member of our development team. Given his unique experience with the company we thought it would be interesting to get his perspective…

What made you decide to come back to work for Exploding Phone?
I enjoyed my time here for my placement year. It confirmed for me that I wanted to go into app development as the role provides a wide variety of projects all with a wide variety of problems to solve. And based on my placement year experience my first choice was always to come back to Exploding Phone.

What were the key technical things that you learnt from your previous internship?
I suppose the key technical thing I learnt last time was a greater understanding of the Android Framework along with learning to code in PHP allowing me to work on the backend of the projects, creating and improving multiple API's.

What were the key things that you learnt in your final year at University?
The most interesting was probably gaining an understanding of how various different AI’s work, as well as creating my own small neural network. I also worked on subjects such as GDPR, Blockchain, Software Engineering, Human Computer Interactions, Data Analysis, and Microservices.

How do you expect the work to differ now compared with when you were an intern?
I anticipate taking on more complicated projects as well as taking on more responsibility for deliverables.

How would you describe the Exploding Phone culture?
I would describe it as professional and hardworking, yet also relaxed and down to earth.