Senior Data Architect: AI & Enterprise Data Strategy

NTT America, Inc.; Johannesburg; Hybrid; ZAR 900,000 - 1,500,000; Full time

Job summary

NTT DATA in Johannesburg is seeking a Senior Data Architect to act as a strategic technical advisor between Sales, Clients, Industry Leaders, Delivery and Global Practices, with a focus on Enterprise Data and AI. This role shapes the Data go-to-market strategy in a high-growth market, backed by a global delivery network and partner ecosystem.

You will help Sales teams develop, influence and close opportunities in data strategy, analytics, cloud data platforms, and related managed services,

Qualifications

• 10+ years in enterprise architecture, consulting, solution strategy or technical pre-sales.
• 8+ years operating in an applications landscape with data & analytics solutions (MDM, Data Quality, Data Governance).
• Strong understanding of enterprise applications, software engineering and modern digital platforms.
• Solid understanding of data platforms, analytics tools, and AI/ML solution offerings.
• Demonstrated experience developing enterprise data strategies, AI adoption roadmaps and information governance models.
• Working knowledge of ontology-based information modelling, knowledge graphs, metadata management and semantic architectures.
• Strong understanding of Microsoft Data & AI, AWS Data & AI, Snowflake and other technology ecosystems.
• Ability to develop industry reference architectures for Financial Services, Manufacturing, Mining or Healthcare advisable.
• Strong commercial acumen, proposal development and executive presentation capability.
• Ability to interrogate delivery models, estimates and commercial risk.

Responsibilities

• Act as a strategic advisor to Sales and Client Managers, leading executive-level discovery and value-led conversations.
• Facilitate Client discussions on business requirements related to data and applications estate, governance and AI readiness.
• Help shape and inform client deals and develop client opportunities alongside our Sales team.
• Define target-state architectures conceptually, capability roadmaps and investment priorities.
• Help inform and build commercial models to support client opportunities.
• Validate architecture, security, integration, data governance, AI governance and delivery approaches with client and internal specialists.
• Review solution estimates, delivery assumptions, commercial models and execution risks.
• Translate complex technical strategies into compelling executive narratives, proposals and statements of work.
• Localise global application offers and help develop industry-specific offerings for the South African market.
• Mentor sales teams by raising technical capability and improving qualification discipline.

Skills

Enterprise architecture

Pre-sales strategy

Executive engagement

Data & AI strategy

Cloud platforms

Data governance

Knowledge graphs

Microsoft Azure

Tools

Snowflake

Databricks

Microsoft Fabric

AWS

Job description

NTT DATA in Johannesburg is seeking a Senior Data Architect to act as a strategic technical advisor between Sales, Clients, Industry Leaders, Delivery and Global Practices, with a focus on Enterprise Data and AI. This role shapes the Data go-to-market strategy in a high-growth market, backed by a global delivery network and partner ecosystem.

You will help Sales teams develop, influence and close opportunities in data strategy, analytics, cloud data platforms, and related managed services,