Sr. Staff Platform Architect

Business Area: IT Seniority Level: Mid-Senior level Job Description: At Cloudera, we empower people to transform complex data into clear and actionable insights. With as much data under management as the hyperscalers, we're the preferred data partner for the top companies in almost every industry.  Powered by the relentless innovation of the open source community, Cloudera advances digital transformation for the world’s largest enterprises. We are seeking a visionary and hands-on Sr. Staff Platform Architect to spearhead the greenfield development of our next-generation Internal Developer Platform (IDP) and Event Mesh. This critical role has a dual mandate: to modernize and automate our core IT infrastructure while simultaneously delivering a cutting-edge AI-First Development Platform. You will be responsible for building a highly governed, self-service platform on AWS (EKS, MSK). This foundation will power a highly automated, event-driven infrastructure and an Everything as Code (EaC) RAG architecture specifically optimized for AI-first application development. Crucially, this role requires a Platform as a Product philosophy. Beyond building the physical infrastructure, you will design and implement the automated toolchains, Everything-as-Code (EaC) pipelines, and AI-assisted workflows necessary to securely and rapidly onboard legacy development teams onto the new architecture, enabling them to fully leverage modern AI development pattern s. As a Sr. Staff Platform Architect, you will: Infrastructure Engineering (50%): Architect and deploy a secure, multi-tenant AWS foundation utilizing Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS) and Managed Streaming for Apache Kafka (MSK). Implement Istio service mesh for zero-trust networking and distributed tracing. Platform & DevEx Engineering (50%): Build the Paved Road. Establish zero-touch GitOps deployment pipelines (ArgoCD/Flux) and mandate Infrastructure-as-Code(IaC) through Terraform. Policy & Governance: Implement automated architectural and security governance using Policy-as-Code (Open Policy Agent/Rego) to enforce guardrails natively within CI/CD pipelines. Data Contracts: Enforce strict data governance using AWS Glue Schema Registry and Avro/Protobuf to establish canonical data contracts across the enterprise. AI-First Tooling: Integrate LLM API gateways into the deployment pipelines to assist development teams with infrastructure code generation, schema translation, and automated architectural review. We are excited about you if you have: 8 years in Cloud Infrastructure, Site Reliability Engineering (SRE), or Platform Engineering. Deep expertise in AWS, specifically EKS and MSK (or enterprise Apache Kafka). Advanced proficiency in Terraform and GitOps methodologies (ArgoCD or Flux). Experience writing and enforcing Policy-as-Code (OPA, Checkov, or Kyverno). Strong understanding of event-driven architectures, schema registries (Avro/Protobuf), and distributed tracing. Demonstrated ability to treat platform engineering as a software development discipline, focusing on Developer Experience (DevEx) and self-service automation. This role is not eligible for immigration sponsorship. What you can expect from us: Generous PTO Policy Support work life balance with Unplugged Days Flexible WFH Policy Mental & Physical Wellness programs Phone and Internet Reimbursement program Access to Continued Career Development Comprehensive Benefits and Competitive Packages Paid Volunteer Time Employee Resource Groups EEO/VEVRAA #LI-SZ1 #LI-REMOTE