AWS Lakehouse Platform Engineer

Riverflex; Abu Dhabi; On-site; AED 300,000 - 540,000; Full time

Job summary

Riverflex is partnering with a leading UAE financial institution to establish an AWS lakehouse PoC. The Platform Engineer will own architecture, governance, and long-term operability, embedding with on-site teams to ensure a robust foundation for analytics and AI use cases.

The role emphasizes platform ownership rather than data pipelines, focusing on secure, scalable, and enterprise-grade design in a regulated environment. On-site UAE presence is required for initial period.

Qualifications

• 6+ years in platform/cloud/data platform engineering roles.
• Ability to own platform architectures end-to-end.
• Experience with AWS lakehouse technologies and governance.

Responsibilities

• Own end-to-end design and delivery of an AWS lakehouse PoC.
• Define reference architectures and engineering standards.
• Implement governed lakehouse using S3, Glue, Athena, Lake Formation with Iceberg.

Skills

Platform engineering

Cloud architecture

Security design

IaC

Well-Architected

Stakeholder leadership

Tools

AWS S3

AWS Glue

AWS Athena

Lake Formation

Apache Iceberg

Terraform

AWS CDK

Job description

Job Title: AWS Lakehouse Platform Engineer

Location: UAE Abu Dhabi or Dubai
Engagement: Full-time (On-site)
Contract duration: 3 or 6 months possible extensions
Start date: February 2026

Riverflex is partnering with a leading financial institution in the UAE on a strategic Proof of Concept to establish (the foundations of) an AWS data platform. We are seeking a Platform Engineer to own the PoC end-to-end define the reference architecture and establish the standards and guardrails that will shape how the data platform is built going forward.

This is not a data engineering role. This position is about platform ownership architecture governance and long-term operability. You will serve as the internal authority on how we do data platforms working closely with the partners Data Lead and embedded with the on-site platform engineering team to ensure the foundation is robust scalable and fit for enterprise-grade analytics and future AI use cases.

Responsibilities

Platform ownership & architecture

• Own the end-to-end design and delivery of an AWS-based lakehouse Proof of Concept.
• Act as lead architect and custodian of the data platform defining reference architectures reusable patterns and engineering standards.
• Design and implement a governed lakehouse architecture using Amazon S3 AWS Glue Athena Lake Formation with Apache Iceberg as a core tableformat.

Governance security & control

• Establish security-first platform designs including IAM patterns and role-based access Data access controls governance guardrails auditability etc.
• Ensure consistent cataloging lineage and metadata practices across the lakehouse.

Engineering & operability

• Build and manage platform infrastructure using Infrastructure as Code (AWS CDK or Terraform).
• Ensure the platform is production-minded with explicit focus on: long-term operability scalability cost efficiency and maintainability
• Define and implement operational standards including monitoring alerting and basic runbooks where applicable.

Collaboration & enablement

• Partner closely with the Data Lead to align platform architecture with data engineering and analytics needs.
• Work embedded with the on-site platform engineering team acting as a hands-on technical leader and mentor.
• Document architectural decisions standards and operating models to enable reuse and scaling beyond the PoC.

Job requirements

• 6 years of experience in platform engineering cloud engineering or data platform engineering roles.
• Proven experience owning and shaping platform architectures rather than only implementing pipelines.
• Deep hands-on experience with:
  • Amazon S3 (storage patterns lifecycle policies)
  • Glue (jobs catalog orchestration)
  • Athena
  • Lake Formation
  • Apache Iceberg
  • AWS CDK or Terraform
• Strong understanding of AWS Well-Architected Framework and platform best practices.
• Ability to design for reliability cost control and operational simplicity.
• Architectural mindset and being comfortable operating with reference architectures engineering standards guardrails and governance models
• Able to balance short-term PoC delivery with long-term platform sustainability.
• Experience in financial services or other regulated environments is a strong advantage.
• Ability to be based in the UAE for a minimum of 3 months working full-time on-site (Abu Dhabi or Dubai).

This is a unique opportunity to define the foundation of a modern enterprise data platform for a major financial institution with real influence over long-term architectural direction - while working on-site in the UAE at the heart of one of the worlds fastest-growing technology and financial hubs. You will operate in a high-impact environment alongside senior stakeholders on a greenfield platform initiative with strong executive backing. If you are interested wed love to connect.