Platform, Engineering & Data Technical Lead (6 ... Digital, Technology & Data · Abu Dhabi

Contango; Abu Dhabi; On-site; AED 420,000 - 660,000; Full time

Job summary

Contango seeks an experienced Platform, Engineering & Data Technical Lead to own the onshore technical authority for a major transformation program in Abu Dhabi. You will oversee orchestration, data platform, and AI-enabled capabilities across multi-workstreams, driving architecture, standards, risk controls, and production readiness.

The role requires hands-on leadership, technical depth, and ability to align technical decisions with business outcomes for senior stakeholders.

Qualifications

• 10+ years across enterprise technology delivery, combining solution architecture, platform engineering, and data engineering.
• Hands-on experience with modern cloud data platforms (Databricks preferred), lakehouse architecture, data modeling, and pipeline design.
• Strong cloud platform experience (Azure preferred) - IaC, RBAC, CI/CD, and monitoring.
• Experience onboarding structured and unstructured data, including document extraction and accuracy tuning.
• Practical experience delivering AI/LLM-enabled capabilities within enterprise applications or workflows.
• Ability to translate technical decisions into business outcomes for senior stakeholders.

Responsibilities

• Act as the senior technical interface to client stakeholders, the incumbent data platform vendor, and parallel initiatives
• Own the end-to-end technical solution across orchestration and data workstreams, ensuring architectural coherence across all components
• Help define architecture components across infrastructure, security, RBAC, data, etc.
• Make and document key technology decisions; surface technical risks and dependencies through governance forums
• Establish and enforce engineering standards - CI/CD pipelines, code review gates, quality controls, etc.
• Provide technical assurance over orchestration platform setup and integration and oversee sprint planning, testing, defect triage, and release readiness
• Own technical go-live sign-off, including cutover and rollback planning
• Lead and mentor offshore engineering, platform, data, and QA teams
• Lead hypercare, stabilization, operations documentation, and knowledge transfer
• Oversee build of ingestion pipelines and transformation logic for structured and unstructured data
• Define the target data model, key business entities, and source-to-target mappings
• Establish data quality, validation, and reconciliation controls to support go-live readiness
• Define the technical approach for AI capabilities embedded within workflows
• Lead extraction and accuracy tuning of unstructured data to support smart features
• Implement evaluation criteria, human-in-the-loop patterns, and guardrails for security and cost control
• Provide technical oversight of the incumbent vendor's platform implementation
• Assess data platform readiness against orchestration requirements and identify gaps

Skills

Platform architecture

Data engineering

Cloud engineering

Databricks

CI/CD pipelines

RBAC security

AI capabilities

Leadership

Stakeholder communication

Tools

Databricks

Azure

CI/CD tools

Job description

Contract duration: 6 months (with a potential extension)
Engagement Type: Full-time
Start date: August 2026
Location: Abu Dhabi (on-site)

About Contango:

Contango is the strategic partner for transformative growth and sustained success for the ADQ portfolio. Our team excels in providing comprehensive growth solutions that combine global best practices with local market expertise. We focus on long-term value creation, empowering our clients to achieve the full scale of their aspirations. As a trusted advisor to ADQ's portfolio companies, Contango helps CEOs drive strategic growth initiatives, navigate disruptive forces, and maximize long-term value creation.

Role Overview

We are seeking an experienced Platform, Engineering & Data Technical Lead to serve as the onshore technical authority for an enterprise transformation program implementing a process orchestration platform, an enterprise data platform, and an integration roadmap across core business streams.

The role owns the end-to-end technical solution, helps define the target architecture and engineering standards, provides technical oversight of the incumbent data platform vendor, and leads the design and delivery of the data foundation and AI-enabled capabilities. The role directs offshore engineering, platform, data, and QA teams, and is accountable for solution quality, technical risk, and production readiness through go-live and stabilization.

This is a hands-on leadership role, requiring both architectural understanding and personal technical depth.

Key Responsibilities

• Act as the senior technical interface to client stakeholders, the incumbent data platform vendor, and parallel initiatives
• Own the end-to-end technical solution across orchestration and data workstreams, ensuring architectural coherence across all components:

Architecture and Engineering Standards

• Help define architecture components across infrastructure, security, RBAC, data, etc.
• Make and document key technology decisions; surface technical risks and dependencies through governance forums
• Establish and enforce engineering standards - CI/CD pipelines, code review gates, quality controls, etc.

Enterprise Data Platform

• Help assess existing data platform readiness against orchestration requirements and identify gaps
• Provide technical oversight of the incumbent vendor's platform implementation
• Define the target data model, key business entities, and source-to-target mappings
• Oversee build of ingestion pipelines and transformation logic for structured and unstructured data
• Establish data quality, validation, and reconciliation controls to support go-live readiness

AI Capabilities

• Define the technical approach for AI capabilities embedded within workflows
• Lead extraction and accuracy tuning of unstructured data to support smart features
• Implement evaluation criteria, human-in-the-loop patterns, and guardrails for security and cost control

Orchestration Platform Delivery Assurance and Go-Live

• Provide technical assurance over orchestration platform setup and integration
• Oversee sprint planning, testing cycles, defect triage, and release readiness
• Own technical go-live sign-off, including cutover and rollback planning
• Lead and mentor offshore engineering, platform, data, and QA teams
• Lead hypercare, stabilization, operations documentation, and knowledge transfer

Required Experience and Qualifications

• Prior experience at management consulting firms and/or Big Tech is an advantage
• Client-serving experience is an advantage
• 10+ years across enterprise technology delivery, combining solution architecture, platform engineering, and data engineering
• Technical lead experience on multi-workstream programs spanning application and data domains
• Strong hands-on experience with modern cloud data platforms (Databricks preferred) - Lakehouse architecture, data modeling, and pipeline design
• Experience onboarding structured and unstructured data, including document extraction and accuracy tuning
• Practical experience delivering AI/LLM-enabled capabilities within enterprise applications or workflows
• Strong cloud platform experience (Azure preferred) - IaC, environment design, RBAC, CI/CD, and monitoring
• Working knowledge of process orchestration concepts (BPMN, human-in-the-loop workflows) and enterprise integration patterns
• Ability to translate technical decisions into business outcomes for senior stakeholders
• Relevant certifications in cloud architecture, data platforms, or AI engineering

Preferred Experience and Qualifications

• Experience delivering enterprise orchestration, automation, or data platform programs in asset-intensive sectors such as marine, logistics, energy, or industrial operations
• Experience leading offshore teams and providing technical assurance over vendor deliverables
• Exposure to Camunda 8 or comparable process orchestration platforms
• Experience with data governance capabilities such as Unity Catalog, Delta Lake, or Microsoft Purview
• Experience defining target architectures, technology roadmaps, and technical business cases for large transformation programs