NaaS Architect Principal

Job Description

Location: While the primary location for this role is Madrid, we are open to considering candidates based in the UK, India, Hungary, or Poland.

At BT International, our purpose is to keep the world connected. As part of BT, we build on almost 180 years of innovation and expertise to deliver secure connectivity and digital services to some of the world’s leading multinational businesses and organisations. Our customers trust us to safeguard their data, drive their digital transformation and keep their businesses running.

With colleagues on the ground across the world and supporting customers wherever they need to operate, BT International offers a truly global experience. Whether it’s about providing cloud connectivity, helping organisations collaborate, or enabling innovation in cybersecurity and digital services, you’ll be part of a team that shapes how businesses succeed in a world that is being transformed by AI.

If you have the drive and ambition to make an impact on a global stage, BT International is where it happens.

Why this job matters?

The NaaS Architect Principal is central to BT International's network transformation strategy and ability to deliver network services at scale. This role owns the architectural vision for Network as a Service ecosystem that directly impacts product velocity, operational efficiency and customer experience. This architect ensures every network architectural decision drives scalability, automation and long-term value. This position leads network platform modernization, establishes API-first patterns for network capabilities and collaborates with senior stakeholders. By bridging network and systems architecture to deliver integrated customer experiences, the role ensures BT International remains competitive, agile and customer-focused in a rapidly evolving global landscape.

What you’ll be doing – your accountabilities

• Define and lead the architectural strategy for NaaS platform evolution, establishing target state architectures that balance functional requirements with non-functional requirements including scalability, resilience, security and cost optimization
• Work hand in hand with product engineering squads to provide hands-on architectural guidance, working directly with engineers to deliver product excellence as well as technical spikes and proof-of-concepts
• Drive API-first architecture across network services, establishing patterns for exposing network capabilities through modern integration approaches including RESTful APIs, gRPC and event-driven patterns, with alignment to industry standards including TMF, MEF and CAMARA
• Lead vendor rationalization strategy across network equipment vendors, cloud providers and orchestration platforms, reducing vendor dependencies through strategic build vs buy decisions and phasing out unnecessary third-party systems in favor of composable in-house capabilities
• Champion modern architecture patterns including infrastructure-as-code, GitOps, automated provisioning and cloud-native networking that enable continuous delivery and operational excellence
• Establish observability frameworks for network services including telemetry pipelines, metrics collection, distributed tracing and logging strategies that enable proactive operations and rapid troubleshooting
• Collaborate with platform engineering teams to build Internal Developer Platform capabilities that abstract network complexity and provide self-service access to network functions
• Drive architectural governance through design reviews and conformance processes, ensuring solutions align with platform standards while empowering product team autonomy
• Provide technical thought leadership on network architecture including SDN underlay, control plane, management plane APIs and telemetry, translating industry trends and technological advances into roadmaps that align with BT International's platform strategy
• Mentor architects and engineers, fostering architectural thinking and technical leadership capability across both the architecture and product engineering organizations

The skills you’ll need to succeed

• Strategic Architecture Leadership – Proven ability to define and communicate network architectural vision, with track record driving large-scale network transformation programs in service provider or cloud environments
• Network Architecture Expertise – Deep understanding of service provider networks including SDN, segment routing, MPLS, BGP and overlay technologies, combined with cloud-native networking and container networking patterns
• Platform Engineering Mindset – Strong understanding of platform-as-a-product principles, building self-service capabilities and treating internal teams as customers with clear SLAs
• API & Integration Architecture – Extensive experience designing API-driven architectures using RESTful, gRPC and event-driven patterns, with knowledge of industry standards including TMF, MEF and CAMARA
• Technical Depth – Hands-on background in network engineering with coding capability in at least one language (Python, Go) and participation in technical spike or proof of concept work
• Automation & Infrastructure-as-Code – Strong background in network automation, infrastructure-as-code (Terraform, Ansible) and GitOps with Flux/Argo CD
• Cloud-Native & Multi-Cloud – Experience with cloud-native patterns including Kubernetes, containers and orchestration, operating across multi-vendor and multi-cloud environments
• Observability & Network Operations – Knowledge of observability systems (ELK, Prometheus, Grafana, gNMI), telemetry pipelines, event streaming platforms (Kafka), orchestration platforms (Itential, NetBox) and traffic engineering controllers
• Telco Transformation Context – Experience navigating organizational and technical challenges of telco network modernization while maintaining operational continuity
• Zero Touch Operations – Knowledge of intent-based networking, automated remediation, workflow-driven operations and compliance management that enable zero-touch networking principles
• Network Testing & Validation – Experience with BDD/Gherkin test definitions, Robot Framework automation and portable testing strategies that enable vendor-agnostic validation
• Traffic Engineering – Understanding of PCEP, centralized TE controllers and optimization strategies for network path management

Experience you’d be expected to have

• Strong engineering background with hands-on experience in network engineering or software development, demonstrating technical credibility through active contribution to architecture implementations
• Extensive experience designing and delivering Network-as-a-Service platforms in complex telco or cloud provider environments, with proven success moving from manual provisioning to API-driven automation
• Proven track record working hand in hand with product engineering teams, participating in agile delivery and contributing technical work
• Significant experience with network automation and infrastructure-as-code practices, implementing CI/CD pipelines for network services and establishing automated testing strategies
• Strong background establishing API-first integration architectures for network capabilities, including work with API management platforms, event streaming and microservices patterns
• Experience working across multi-vendor network environments with major vendors (Juniper, Cisco, Nokia) while introducing open-source and cloud-native alternatives
• Demonstrated success building platform capabilities that enable engineering team autonomy, including Internal Developer Platforms and self-service tooling
• Experience implementing observable event-driven architectures enabling real-time network operations, predictive analytics and closed-loop remediation

Leadership Accountabilities

• Owning outcomes: I take the right decisions that benefit the broader organisation
• Delivering for the customer: I execute brilliantly on clear priorities that add value to our customers and the wider business.
• Growth mindset: I experiment and identify opportunities for growth for both myself and the organisation