Nothing wrong with memory. But you have to be able to think too.
I was an Engineer engineering manager for many years. I had the misfortune to hire some of these cheaper foreign engineers (these were from India). Their educational vitae were excellent, grades good all the right stuff. The problem is that the learning was all rote. No imagination, or entrepreneurial drive or innovation behind it. They mostly only did enough to get by while they schemed to get all the company benefits they could, use up as much overhead time they could and never really deliver on what they promised. Their main goal was to get US Citizenship, nothing else above that.
I learned something very clear through this. The American engineer usually looks for the simplest and quickest way to accomplish the goals to fit the requirement parameters, and often times their product output is elegant in a way.
This company is going to find out the hard way, I think.