Principal Architect - Domain Frontier Engineer - Telecom

What makes Cognizant a unique place to work? The combination of rapid growth and an international and innovative environment! This is creating many opportunities for people like YOU — people with an entrepreneurial spirit who want to make a difference in this world.

At Cognizant, together with your colleagues from all around the world, you will collaborate on creating solutions for the world's leading companies and help them become more flexible, more innovative, and successful. Moreover, this is your chance to be part of the success story.

Position Summary:
We are looking for a seasoned Java Architect (Principal Architect - Domain Frontier Engineer - Telecom) to lead the design and modernization of enterprise-grade systems within our Telecom business unit. The ideal candidate will bring deep expertise in legacy-to-cloud transformation, strong architectural leadership in Java/Spring Boot microservices, and hands-on exposure to AWS and AI-driven solutions. This role requires someone who has navigated the complexities of large-scale telecom platforms — OSS/BSS, billing, provisioning, network management, or customer experience systems — and successfully led their transition from monolithic/legacy architectures to modern, scalable, cloud-native ecosystems.

Key Responsibilities:
•Own end-to-end architecture and technical design for large-scale telecom applications, ensuring scalability, security, and performance.
•Legacy Modernization: Lead legacy modernization initiatives — assess existing monolithic/legacy telecom systems and design phased migration strategies to microservices and cloud-native architectures.
•Architect and guide development of Spring Boot–based microservices, ensuring adherence to best practices (domain-driven design, API-first design, event-driven patterns, etc.).
•Define and drive cloud architecture on AWS (EC2, ECS/EKS, Lambda, RDS, S3, API Gateway, etc.), including cost optimization, high availability, and disaster recovery strategies.
•Identify and integrate AI/ML capabilities into telecom workflows (e.g., predictive maintenance, network optimization, customer churn analysis, intelligent automation, GenAI-based assistants).
•Collaborate with business stakeholders, product owners, and engineering teams to translate telecom domain requirements (OSS/BSS, CRM, billing, network operations) into technical solutions.
•Establish architectural governance — coding standards, design reviews, technical documentation, and CI/CD practices.
•Mentor and guide development teams, conduct architecture reviews, and ensure alignment with enterprise architecture principles.
•Evaluate and recommend tools, frameworks, and technologies to improve system reliability, scalability, and maintainability.
•Manage technical risk during migration — ensuring zero/minimal disruption to live telecom operations during cutover phases.

Required Skills & Experience:
•12–20 years of overall IT experience, with a significant portion in solution/technical architecture roles.
•Strong hands-on and architectural experience in Java, Spring Boot, and Microservices architecture.
•Proven experience with AWS cloud services — architecting, deploying, and managing applications on AWS.
•Practical exposure to AI/ML integration within enterprise applications (LLMs, GenAI, ML pipelines, or intelligent automation — any relevant exposure is a plus).

Mandatory Skills:
•Prior experience working on Telecom domain projects (OSS/BSS, billing, network management, provisioning, CRM, or similar).
•Demonstrated experience leading legacy system modernization/transformation projects — migrating monolith to microservices, on-prem to cloud, or similar large-scale re-architecture efforts.
•Strong understanding of API design (REST/GraphQL), event-driven architecture (Kafka/RabbitMQ), and containerization (Docker, Kubernetes).
•Familiarity with DevOps practices, CI/CD pipelines, and Infrastructure as Code (Terraform/CloudFormation) is a plus.
•Excellent stakeholder management, communication, and leadership skills — ability to work with both technical teams and business leadership.
•Relevant certifications (AWS Solutions Architect, TOGAF, or similar) are a plus.

Salary Range: >$100,000
Date of Posting: 11-Aug-26

Next Steps: If you feel this opportunity suits you, or Cognizant is the type of organization you would like to join, we want to have a conversation with you! Please apply directly with us.

For a complete list of open opportunities with Cognizant, visit http://www.cognizant.com/careers. Cognizant is committed to providing Equal Employment Opportunities. Successful candidates will be required to undergo a background check.