Senior DevOps Engineer

Oxford Nanopore Technologies is headquartered at the Oxford Science Park outside Oxford, UK, with satellite offices and a commercial presence in many global locations across the US, APAC and Europe.

Oxford Nanopore employs from multiple subject areas including nanopore science, molecular biology and applications, informatics, engineering, electronics, manufacturing and commercialisation. The management team, led by CEO Dr Gordon Sanghera, has a track record of delivering disruptive technologies to the market.

Oxford Nanopore’s sequencing platform is the only technology that offers real-time analysis, in fully scalable formats from pocket to population scale, that can analyse native DNA or RNA and sequence any length of fragment to achieve short to ultra-long read lengths. Our goal is to enable the analysis of any living thing, by anyone, anywhere!

We are seeking an exceptionally motivated individual to join us as a Senior DevOps Engineer. In this role, you will play a collaborative and pivotal part in overseeing the maintenance and deployment of critical infrastructure, including databases and web applications, in coordination with our development teams across ONT.

Working closely with the System Engineering Manager, you will become an integral member of a dynamic team of IT professionals, collectively dedicated to offering comprehensive support for both production and development.

Key Responsibilities:

• System Administration and Automation:
  • Manage Linux systems (Ubuntu) both on-premises and in the cloud.
  • Create and maintain Ansible playbooks for infrastructure deployment and automation
  • Perform routine system administration tasks, including patching, capacity management, and alert resolution
  • Handle complex problem investigation and resolution, managing change, incident, and problem management processes
• Cloud and Infrastructure Projects:
  • Lead migration projects to the cloud
  • Overhaul and continuously improve both cloud and on-premises infrastructure to ensure scalability and reliability
  • Develop automated deployment and maintenance methods in collaboration with development teams
• Security and Best Practices:
  • Advocate for and implement best security practices within the system engineering and development processes
  • Suggest and implement code or tool enhancements with a focus on security
• Containerization and Orchestration:
  • Support and troubleshoot Docker containers and Docker Swarm in on-prem and cloud.
  • Utilize container orchestration technologies like Kubernetes for scalable deployments
• Monitoring and Maintenance:
  • Build and maintain monitoring and alerting using Grafana
  • Maintain a knowledge base with wiki articles for common issues and solutions
• Change, Incident, and Problem Management:
  • Investigate and resolve complex problems
  • Represent proposed changes at CAB meetings
  • Liaise with stakeholders to agree on appropriate courses of action
  • Handle escalated user tickets

What We’re Looking For:

• Essential Skills and Experience:
  • Linux systems administration (Ubuntu primarily)
  • Ansible for automation and orchestration
  • Strong scripting (Python & Bash)
  • Containerization and orchestration technologies (Docker & Kubernetes)
  • Cloud experience, particularly with AWS
  • Terraform for developing and managing complex infrastructure as code
  • Open-source monitoring technologies (e.g. Grafana)
  • Comfortable working in both agile and ITIL environments
  • Strong communication and organisational skills for coordinating with stakeholders, users, other internal teams and suppliers
• Preferred Skills and Experience
  • VMware vSphere and vCenter
  • DevOps tools and application administration (GitLab, Jira & Confluence, Artifactory, Vault, Rundeck)
  • Experience supporting IT in varied environments such as manufacturing and logistics, software development and quality assurance

Summary:

This role is ideal for a DevOps Engineer who is passionate about Linux system administration, cloud technologies, continuous improvement, and automation. You will be pivotal in migrating our infrastructure to the cloud, enhancing our on-premises setup, and supporting a range of DevOps tools. If you thrive in a dynamic environment and are skilled in both cloud and on-premises technologies, we would love to hear from you.

We offer outstanding benefits to include an attractive bonus, generous pension contributions, private healthcare and an excellent starting salary. Based within beautiful, landscaped surroundings with tree-lined walks, water features and a lake, all of which make for a wonderful working environment.

If you are looking to utilise your skills to really make a difference to humankind, then consider joining our team and apply today!

Please note that no terminology in this advert is intended to discriminate on the grounds of a person's gender, marital status, race, religion, colour, age, disability or sexual orientation. Every candidate will be assessed only in accordance with their merits, qualifications and abilities to perform the duties of the job.

#li-mo1