DevOps Engineer / Cloud Architect Azure

Cognizant; Kolkata District, Chennai District, Bengaluru; Hybrid; INR 2,500,000 - 4,500,000; Full time

Job summary

Cognizant in Kolkata is seeking a Cloud Architect to design and own the target-state cloud platform for an AI-enabled application. You will translate architectures into Terraform-based infrastructure and guide teams through deployment across compute, network, and data layers.

The role emphasizes building scalable, secure, and observable systems with AKS, Terraform, and Azure services, while mentoring engineers on DevOps best practices.

Qualifications

• Design cloud architecture for a cloud-native AI platform.
• Define RBAC/IAM and secret-management strategies.
• Implement IaC for infrastructure provisioning.
• Lead CI/CD automation across backend/frontend/AI services.

Responsibilities

• Design and own the target-state cloud architecture compute, networking, data, and security layers for a cloud-native, AI-enabled application platform, and translate it into infrastructure-as-code (Terraform or equivalent).
• Define the Kubernetes, container registry, database, object storage, secrets management, and networking topology, and guide implementation teams through build-out.
• Architect and continuously improve CI/CD pipelines and source-control workflows to automate build, test, and deployment of backend, frontend, and AI-agent services.
• Design identity and access strategy (RBAC/IAM, managed identities, key/secret stores) that enforces least privilege while remaining operable at scale.
• Define the observability strategy — logging, monitoring, tracing, and alerting — for application, container, and AI/LLM runtime metrics.
• Architect the integration of AI/RAG components (knowledge bases, agents, vector search, model endpoints) with the platform's data and API layers.
• Lead root-cause analysis and drive resolution of complex deployment, connectivity, and performance issues across compute, network, and data layers.
• Establish infrastructure standards, reference architectures, and reusable modules; maintain deployment documentation, runbooks, and environment configuration across dev/test/prod.
• Evaluate architecture for cost efficiency, scalability, resilience, and disaster recovery, and recommend improvements.
• Partner with application, security, and AI engineering leads to align infrastructure decisions with product and business goals, and mentor engineers on cloud and DevOps best practices.
• Design and provision the AKS cluster and supporting VNet/subnet topology (private and public subnets for AKS nodes and database segregation).
• Architect the data layer using Azure Database for PostgreSQL (flexible server), Azure Storage Accounts, and Azure Container Registry (ACR).
• Set up Azure Function Apps and an Azure App Service Environment for application and backend API logic, with Azure API Management for secure HTTPS routing.
• Design VNet integration and private endpoints so API Management and Function Apps communicate privately.
• Design DNS and ingress via Azure DNS Zones and Load Balancer, and configure Managed Identities (control plane, CI/CD runners, Function Apps, API Management).
• Design the secrets and credential strategy using Azure Key Vault for application and third-party service credentials.
• Define Azure Monitor logging, metrics, tracing, and container insights, and review the architecture periodically for cost, security, and resilience improvements.
• Architect CI/CD pipelines (e.g., GitHub Actions or Azure DevOps) for build/deploy automation.

Skills

Cloud Architecture

DevOps Leadership

Security & IAM

Cost Optimization

Tools

AKS

Kubernetes

Terraform

CI/CD

GitHub Actions

Azure Key Vault

Azure API Management

Azure Monitor

Job description

Key Responsibilities

• Design and own the target-state cloud architecture compute, networking, data, and security layers for a cloud-native, AI-enabled application platform, and translate it into infrastructure-as-code (Terraform or equivalent).


• Define the Kubernetes, container registry, database, object storage, secrets management, and networking topology, and guide implementation teams through build-out.


• Architect and continuously improve CI/CD pipelines and source-control workflows to automate build, test, and deployment of backend, frontend, and AI-agent services.


• Design identity and access strategy (RBAC/IAM, managed identities, key/secret stores) that enforces least privilege while remaining operable at scale.


• Define the observability strategy — logging, monitoring, tracing, and alerting — for application, container, and AI/LLM runtime metrics.


• Architect the integration of AI/RAG components (knowledge bases, agents, vector search, model endpoints) with the platform's data and API layers.


• Lead root-cause analysis and drive resolution of complex deployment, connectivity, and performance issues across compute, network, and data layers.


• Establish infrastructure standards, reference architectures, and reusable modules; maintain deployment documentation, runbooks, and environment configuration across dev/test/prod.


• Evaluate architecture for cost efficiency, scalability, resilience, and disaster recovery, and recommend improvements.


• Partner with application, security, and AI engineering leads to align infrastructure decisions with product and business goals, and mentor engineers on cloud and DevOps best practices.


• Design and provision the AKS cluster and supporting VNet/subnet topology (private and public subnets for AKS nodes and database segregation).


• Architect the data layer using Azure Database for PostgreSQL (flexible server), Azure Storage Accounts, and Azure Container Registry (ACR).


• Set up Azure Function Apps and an Azure App Service Environment for application and backend API logic, with Azure API Management for secure HTTPS routing.


• Design VNet integration and private endpoints so API Management and Function Apps communicate privately.


• Design DNS and ingress via Azure DNS Zones and Load Balancer, and configure Managed Identities (control plane, CI/CD runners, Function Apps, API Management).


• Design the secrets and credential strategy using Azure Key Vault for application and third-party service credentials.


• Define Azure Monitor logging, metrics, tracing, and container insights, and review the architecture periodically for cost, security, and resilience improvements.


• Architect CI/CD pipelines (e.g., GitHub Actions or Azure DevOps) for build/deploy automation.

Required Technical Skills — Microsoft Azure Compute & Orchestration: AKS, Kubernetes, Azure Virtual Machines (jump host) Data & Storage: Azure Database for PostgreSQL (flexible server), Azure Storage Account Serverless & Integration: Azure Function App, Azure App Service Environment, Azure API Management Networking: VNet, Private Endpoints, Azure DNS Zones, Load Balancer / Ingress Security & Identity: Azure Key Vault, Azure Managed Identity, Azure RBAC, Azure AD SSO CI/CD: GitHub Actions (or equivalent), Infrastructure-as-code tooling, Git-based source control Runtime / Dev Portal: Internal developer portal tooling, Node.js, PostgreSQL