Lead Site Reliability Engineer, Data Platform - AI/ML Infrastructure

Cisco Systems, Inc.; Bengaluru; On-site; INR 3,500,000 - 7,000,000; Full time

Job summary

Cisco ThousandEyes is seeking an SRE Technical Leader for the Network Assurance Data Platform (NADP) to ensure the reliability, scalability and security of our cloud and big data platforms across multi-region deployments. You will mentor teams, define the technical roadmap, collaborate with software, product, customers and security, and drive automation and observability to support ML/AI workloads.

Strong programming in Python or Go, hands-on cloud experience (AWS preferred), and

Qualifications

• Ability to design scalable and well-tested SRE solutions with focus on reliability.
• Strong hands-on cloud experience, preferably AWS.
• Infrastructure as Code expertise, especially Terraform and Kubernetes/EKS.
• Hands-on expertise scaling production AI/ML infrastructure using Hadoop ecosystem (Spark, Hive, HDFS, Gobblin), Airflow, and AWS data services like EMR and SageMaker.
• Ability to write high quality code in Python, Go, or equivalent languages.

Responsibilities

• Design, build, and optimize cloud and data infrastructure for high availability, reliability, and scalability of big-data and ML/AI systems, with solid SRE practices.
• Collaborate with customers, development, product management, and security teams to create secure, scalable solutions for ML/AI workloads and automation.
• Troubleshoot production issues, perform root cause analyses, and contribute to postmortems and performance improvements.
• Lead architectural vision and guide the team's technical roadmap, balancing near-term needs with long-term goals.
• Mentor and lead teams, fostering engineering and operational excellence across the organization.
• Engage stakeholders to translate use cases into actionable insights and drive alignment at all levels.
• Utilize strong programming skills to integrate software and systems, building core data platform capabilities and automation.
• Develop strategic roadmaps, processes, and infrastructure to deploy software components at enterprise scale with best practices.

Skills

AWS cloud experience

Python/Go programming

SRE leadership

Root cause analysis

Observability & monitoring

Tools

Terraform

Kubernetes/EKS

Prometheus

Grafana

OpenTelemetry

CloudWatch

ELK stack

Airflow

Job description

Meet the Team Cisco ThousandEyes is a Digital Assurance platform that empowers organizations to deliver flawless digital experiences across every network - even the ones they don’t own. Powered by AI and an unmatched set of cloud, internet and enterprise network telemetry data, ThousandEyes enables IT teams to proactively detect, diagnose, and remediate issues - before they impact end- user experiences. ThousandEyes is deeply integrated across the entire Cisco technology portfolio and beyond, helping customers deploy at scale while also delivering AI-powered assurance insights within Cisco’s leading Networking, Security, Collaboration, and Observability portfolios.

Your Impact

As a Site Reliability Engineering (SRE) Technical Leader on the Network Assurance Data Platform (NADP) team, you will play a key role in ensuring the reliability, scalability, and security of our cloud and big data platforms. You will represent the NADP SRE team, working in a dynamic environment, tackling challenges with creativity, providing technical leadership in defining and delivering on the team's technical roadmap. You will collaborate with cross-functional teams, including software development, product management, customers and security teams, to design, influence, build, and maintain SaaS systems operating at multi-region scale. Your work will directly impact the success of our machine learning (ML) and AI initiatives by ensuring the underlying platform infrastructure is robust, efficient, and aligned with operational excellence.

• Design, build, and optimize cloud and data infrastructure to ensure the high availability, reliability, and scalability of big-data and ML/AI systems to meet customer needs, while implementing SRE principles such as monitoring, alerting, error budgets, and fault analysis.

• Collaborate closely with cross-functional teams, including customers, development, product management, and security teams, to create secure, scalable solutions that support ML/AI workloads and enhance operational efficiency through automation.

• Troubleshoot complex technical problems in production environments, perform root cause analyses, and contribute to continuous improvement efforts through postmortem reviews and proactive performance optimization.

• Lead the architectural vision and shape the team’s technical strategy and roadmap, balancing immediate needs with long-term goals, driving innovation, and influencing the technical direction.

• Serve as a mentor and technical leader, guiding teams and fostering a culture of engineering and operational excellence by sharing your deep knowledge and experience.

• Engage with customers and stakeholders to understand use cases and feedback, translating them into actionable insights and effectively influencing stakeholders at all levels.

• Utilize your strong programming skills to integrate software and systems engineering, building core data platform capabilities and automation to meet enterprise customer needs and roadmap objectives.

• Develop strategic roadmaps, processes, plans, and infrastructure to efficiently deploy new software components at an enterprise scale while enforcing engineering best practices.

Minimum Qualifications

• Ability to design and implement scalable and well tested solutions, with focus on operational efficiency.

• Strong hands-on cloud experience, preferably AWS.

• Infrastructure as a Code expertise, especially Terraform and Kubernetes/EKS.

• Hands-on expertise scaling and orchestrating production AI/ML infrastructure using the Hadoop ecosystem (Spark, Hive, HDFS, Gobblin), Airflow, and AWS big data services like EMR and SageMaker.

• Ability to write high quality code in Python, Go, or equivalent programming languages.

Preferred Qualifications

• Solid understanding of Unix/Linux systems, the kernel, system libraries, file systems, and client-server protocols.

• Have experience with architecting software and infrastructure at scale with a sense of ownership and accountability.

• Experience with observability tools including Prometheus (Alertmanager), Grafana, Thanos, CloudWatch, OpenTelemetry, and the ELK stack.

• Certifications: CKA (Certified Kubernetes Administrator), CKAD (Certified Kubernetes Application Developer), AWS Certified DevOps Engineer, or equivalent certifications in cloud and security domains.

Why Cisco?

At Cisco, we’re revolutionizing how data and infrastructure connect and protect organizations in the AI era – and beyond. We’ve been innovating fearlessly for 40 years to create solutions that power how humans and technology work together across the physical and digital worlds. These solutions provide customers with unparalleled security, visibility, and insights across the entire digital footprint.

Fueled by the depth and breadth of our technology, we experiment and create meaningful solutions. Add to that our worldwide network of doers and experts, and you’ll see that the opportunities to grow and build are limitless. We work as a team, collaborating with empathy to make really big things happen on a global scale. Because our solutions are everywhere, our impact is everywhere.

We are Cisco, and our power starts with you.