AKS DevOps Engineer - Azure Kubernetes

AKS DevOps Engineer - Azure Kubernetes

• Salary: Up to £70,000 per annum dependent upon experience + benefits
• Location: Cardiff or Gatwick, 1 day per month

Join a recognised world leader in aviation safety and innovation. We are looking for a Senior Platform Engineer to evolve and operate ourAzure Kubernetes platform for our Drones systems. This role offers a hands-on technical challenge with significant influence across architecture, automation, systems reliability, and operational use.

This role requires eligibility for SC (Security Check) clearance. The minimum requirements include at least five years of continuous UK residency, no criminal record (or only minor offences), and a clean credit history (no bankruptcies, CCJs, or significant unsecured debt). Please only apply if you meet these requirements.

Day-to-day of the role:

• Design, build, and support the platforms that underpin the digital services used by our drone’s community.
• Act as the escalation point for platform-level incidents, requiring broad troubleshooting capability across networking, Kubernetes, CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure-as-code, and application configuration.
• Shape best practice in cloud engineering and contribute to the ongoing development of our platform strategy.
• Operate and manageAzure Kubernetes platforms, including cluster configuration, upgrades, and workload troubleshooting.
• Lead incident resolution for platform issues and perform root cause analysis.
• Build, maintain, and evolve cloud components across IaaS and PaaS services.
• Design and implement CI/CD pipelines using Azure DevOps with YAML.
• Implement and maintain secure networking patterns and apply cloud security best practices.
• Create and maintain platform observability using Azure Monitor, Analytics, and Application Insights.
• Collaborate with engineering teams to ensure service reliability on the platform.
• Promote best practice in cloud engineering and mentor other engineers where appropriate.

Required Skills & Qualifications:

• Experience withMicrosoft Azure (IaaS, PaaS, identity, governance).
• CI/CD delivery experience usingAzure DevOps and YAML pipelines.
• IAC experience with Terraform.
• Kubernetes experience, ideally withAKS(clusters, workloads, ingress, scaling, upgrades).
• Experience with Helm, Helm charts, releases, and repositories.
• Solid understanding of Azure networking: VNets, NSGs, routing, private endpoints, load balancing, etc.
• Scripting proficiency in Bash, PowerShell, or Python.
• Linux operating system knowledge and troubleshooting capability.
• Experience implementing monitoring, logging, and observability solutions in Azure.
• Ability to communicate platform issues like risk, platform health, cost etc to non-technical audiences.

Desirable Skills:

• Experience contributing to architecture or platform design.
• Understanding of microservices and API-driven architectures.
• Experience with SQL, Postgres, Redis, or EventGrid.
• Prior experience in a Senior or Lead engineering role.
• Experience working in hybrid cloud environments.
• Strong understanding of cloud security best practice and secure platform design.

In the first instance please submit your CV.