- Bachelors degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Mathematics, or equivalent industry experience.

- Microsoft Azure Architect certifications preferred; Linux/Windows certifications a plus.

- Strong expertise in Azure networking (VNets, Peering, ExpressRoute, VPNs, private connectivity with Datacenter, 3rd parties, and multi-cloud providers).

- Hands-on experience with scalable architectures Azure VM Scale Sets, Load Balancers, Application Gateways, Traffic Manager, and CDN.

- In-depth knowledge of Azure security best practices IAM, RBAC, Conditional Access, Key Vault, Managed Identities, Security Center, Defender for Cloud, encryption, and compliance frameworks (CIS/NIST).

- Proficiency with Infrastructure as Code (Terraform), scripting (Shell, PowerShell, Python), and CI/CD pipelines.

- Experience in On-prem to Cloud migrations, TCO analysis, DR strategy, and high-availability architectures.

- Experience with serverless technologies (Azure Functions), monitoring tools (Azure Monitor, Log Analytics, CloudWatch, CloudTrail), and automation pipelines.

- Solid understanding of Linux/Windows administration, system hardening, and image management (golden images).

- Familiarity with multi-cloud and SaaS integrations (Salesforce, Tableau, Informatica, on-prem DBs to Azure services like Blob, SQL, Redshift, etc.).