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JOB DESCRIPTION PLATFORM ENGINEER Industry: Manufacturing\/Technology \/ Digital Business Department: Technology -- Applications and Solution Delivery Reporting to:Applications Manager Employment type:Permanent | In -office Location: Bellville, Cape Town Hours: After hours and standby when operationally required Apply: About our client Our client is a growing, technology-enabled business with an expanding digital and enterprise applications environment. Its technology platform supports business-critical applications and integrations, requiring reliable, scalable and secure cloud infrastructure to support continued growth. The opportunity Our client is looking for an experienced Platform Engineer to build, automate and operate its cloud platforms and delivery pipelines. You will take ownership of the AWS and Azure hosting environments, cloud and hybrid networking, infrastructure as code, CI\/CD pipelines, platform observability, cloud performance and cost optimisation. You will work closely with internal application teams and external development partners to ensure that platforms are reliable, secure and capable of supporting business-critical applications. This is a hands-on cloud engineering and DevOps role, rather than a general IT infrastructure or desktop support position. The role includes cloud and hybrid networking, tenant-level configuration and security posture benchmarking. Local office networking, wireless networking, directory services, Microsoft 365 productivity support and end-user computing fall within a separate technical support function. Key responsibilities Cloud platform engineering and reliability Design, build and operate production cloud platforms across AWS and Azure. Maintain platform availability, scalability, resilience and performance. Manage cloud environments, hosting architecture, backups, restoration and disaster recovery. Support application environments across development, testing, staging and production. Identify and resolve platform issues, including performance bottlenecks and infrastructure failures. Cloud networking Design and maintain cloud and hybrid networking between cloud environments and on-premises infrastructure. Manage virtual networks, VPNs, routing, peering, transit connectivity and related network services. Support secure and resilient connectivity between cloud platforms and business environments. Infrastructure automation and DevOps Build and maintain infrastructure as code using tools such as Terraform, CloudFormation or Bicep. Develop and maintain CI\/CD pipelines using platforms such as GitHub Actions or Azure Pipelines. Support automated deployment processes, release management and rollback strategies. Work with developers to improve deployment quality, consistency and speed. Support containerised workloads and orchestration platforms where applicable. Observability and database operations Implement and maintain monitoring, logging, alerting and application observability. Build dashboards and actionable alerts to identify service degradation and operational issues. Support PostgreSQL operations on managed database services such as Amazon RDS, including diagnostics, performance tuning, backups and upgrades. Investigate database and application performance issues through SQL diagnosis, log analysis and operational troubleshooting. Cloud governance, security and cost management Maintain cloud tenant configuration and security posture benchmarking. Monitor security recommendations, configuration baselines and cloud compliance findings. Implement cloud security controls in line with standards defined by the Security and Compliance Manager. Monitor cloud consumption, identify cost optimisation opportunities and support FinOps practices. Work with security and application stakeholders to address vulnerabilities and platform risks. Partner and stakeholder collaboration Work with external development partners and managed service providers on platform requirements and technical issues. Support application releases, cut-overs, go-lives and critical incidents. Maintain architecture documentation, runbooks and operational procedures. Participate in after-hours support and standby arrangements. Minimum requirements Grade 12. A degree or diploma in Information Technology, Computer Science or a related discipline is preferred. AWS Cloud Practitioner certification. AWS Solutions Architect Associate or Professional certification. Relevant Azure certification, such as AZ-900, AZ-104 or AZ-305. ITIL V4 Foundation. Approximately 5--8 years' experience in infrastructure, cloud or platform engineering. At least three years' production experience working with AWS and\/or Azure. At least three years' experience with CI\/CD pipelines and infrastructure as code. Experience designing and supporting scalable, highly available platforms. Practical experience with cloud tenant configuration and security posture assessment. Experience with hybrid or multi-cloud networking, including site-to-site IPsec VPNs, BGP, VPC \/ VNet, transit and peering. Strong Linux and scripting capabilities. At least three years' experience supporting PostgreSQL in a production or managed database environment. Experience with production observability and monitoring platforms. Experience working with external development teams or managed service providers. Willingness to participate in after-hours support and standby. Advantageous experience and qualifications AWS DevOps Professional or Azure AZ-400. AWS Advanced Networking Specialty or Azure AZ-700. HashiCorp Terraform Associate. FinOps Practitioner certification. CIS or NIST-related security certification. Experience supporting Odoo or a similar ERP platform. Experience with Docker, Kubernetes, ECS, EKS or AKS. Technical knowledge You should have practical knowledge of: AWS and Azure architecture and services. Scalable cloud architecture, autoscaling, load balancing, caching, CDN, queues and serverless services. Cloud tenant governance and security tools, including Microsoft Secure Score, Defender for Cloud, Azure Policy, AWS Security Hub and AWS Config. Terraform, CloudFormation, Bicep and other infrastructure-as-code tools. GitHub Actions, Azure Pipelines and automated release strategies. Container platforms and orchestration. Linux administration and scripting using Bash, Python or PowerShell. PostgreSQL and managed database operations, including Amazon RDS. CloudWatch, Azure Monitor, Application Insights, New Relic, Datadog, Dynatrace and OpenTelemetry. Cloud and hybrid networking, including IPAM, routing, BGP, VPNs, transit, ExpressRoute and Direct Connect. Cloud security, IAM, least-privilege access, secrets management, encryption and pipeline scanning. FinOps, cloud cost visibility and optimisation. Disaster recovery, business continuity and ITIL V4 practices. Please note: The database requirement is focused on operational PostgreSQL administration, troubleshooting and performance management, rather than data engineering, ETL or data modelling. Key skills and competencies AWS and Azure platform engineering. Cloud architecture, scalability and resilience. Hybrid cloud networking and connectivity. Infrastructure as code and automation. CI\/CD pipeline development and release management. Linux administration and scripting. PostgreSQL and managed database operations. Observability, monitoring and performance troubleshooting. Cloud security and tenant governance. Disaster recovery and business continuity. Cloud cost management and optimisation. Technical documentation and runbook development. Vendor and development partner coordination. Personal attributes The ideal candidate is analytical, practical and detail-oriented, with the ability to troubleshoot complex technical issues methodically. You should be comfortable working in a fast-paced environment, managing competing priorities and remaining composed when dealing with production incidents. Strong collaboration and communication skills are important, as you will work across technical teams, application developers and external partners. We are looking for someone who takes ownership, continuously improves platform performance and is prepared to challenge existing approaches where better solutions can be implemented.
