Senior Principal - Platform Architect WAN/SDWAN

Overview

The Platform Architect owns the technical design of GSK's wide area network and software-defined WAN platform, defining reference architectures, patterns and standards, and guiding engineering teams in applying them. The role sets standards and provides design assurance; it does not build.

What you'll do

• Define reference architectures, patterns and standards for the platform, aligned to DPTF strategy and to enterprise architecture.
• Design AI into the platform, producing reference patterns for AI-assisted delivery and for intelligent, self-healing operations.
• Architect for reliability and resilience by design, so that platform SLOs and error budgets are achievable rather than aspirational.
• Provide design assurance and technical guidance to engineering teams, reviewing designs against the standards before build rather than after.
• Ensure platform solutions are secure and compliant, including GxP requirements where the platform supports regulated activity.
• Evaluate and introduce new technologies, measuring the result against architecture OKRs rather than adopting on vendor claim.
• Set architecture standards that supplier and managed-service solutions must meet, and assure their designs to the same bar as internal work.
• Partner with Enterprise Architecture and Information Security on standards, roadmaps and exceptions.
• Increase pattern reuse across the platform, tracking where teams have adopted a pattern and where they have diverged and why.
• Reduce rework by intervening early in design, and evidence the reduction rather than asserting it.
• Advise the Product Owner and Platform Manager on the architectural consequence of roadmap choices, including technical debt being accepted.
• Hold the boundaries with the Platform Architecture Director on domain target architecture, the Solution Architect on cross-domain initiative designs, and the engineering teams on build.

What you'll need

• Degree in a technology or engineering discipline (e.g., Computer Science, Software Engineering, Information Systems), or equivalent practical experience.
• Overall 15 years of experience and typically 6-8 years in technology architecture or senior engineering, including at least three years producing reference architectures or standards others build to.
• Deep hands-on depth in the relevant platform domain, whether cloud, network or digital workplace.
• Experience running design assurance or architecture review, including declining designs that did not meet the standard.
• Track record of architecting for reliability and resilience, working to SLOs and error budgets.
• Experience designing secure and compliant solutions, ideally including GxP or another regulated context.
• Experience setting architecture standards that supplier or managed-service solutions had to meet.
• Awareness of AI reference patterns for assisted delivery and intelligent operations.
• Extensive experience designing enterprise wide area network and software defined wide area network services.
• Deep knowledge of Border Gateway Protocol, quality of service, resilient routing, internet connectivity and carrier services.
• Evidence of defining reusable architectures that improved performance, security, resilience or cost.
• Ability to influence engineering teams without line authority, so that patterns are adopted rather than circumvented.
• Judgement about when to grant an architectural exception and when to hold the standard.
• Clear design documentation, since patterns are only reusable if others can follow them.
• Comfort challenging vendor claims and evaluating technology on measured outcome.
• Pragmatism about technical debt, making the cost visible rather than blocking delivery outright.
• Collaborative habit with Enterprise Architecture and Security, whose standards constrain the platform.

Nice to have

• Architecture certifications (e.g., TOGAF, or recognised cloud or network architecture certification relevant to the platform).
• Expert level enterprise routing certification, such as CCIE Enterprise Infrastructure or JNCIE Enterprise Routing and Switching.
• Experience with leading software defined wide area network or secure access service edge platforms.
• Experience with cloud connectivity, network automation or infrastructure as code.

Details

• Location: Bengaluru Luxor North Tower.