Cloud Platform Storage Architect

Verizon Verizon · Telecom · Southlake, TX +4

This role is for a Cloud Platform Storage Architect at Verizon, responsible for leading the requirements, analysis, design, and development efforts for the company's Cloud Platform storage strategy. The architect will focus on unified storage solutions encompassing Block, File, and Object architectures, integrating with OpenStack and Kubernetes, and driving automation through Infrastructure-as-Code. The role involves technical leadership, vendor management, and stakeholder communication to simplify storage consumption, reduce TCO, and modernize the network architecture.

What you'd actually do

  1. Architecting multi-protocol storage solutions (SAN, NAS, and S3-compatible Object storage) to support diverse workloads ranging from high-performance databases to massive unstructured data lakes.
  2. Leading the design and lifecycle planning of all storage platforms, ensuring seamless integration with OpenStack (Cinder/Manila) and Kubernetes (CSI) environments.
  3. Creating High-Level (HLD) and Low-Level Designs (LLD) that define how compute nodes consume storage via iSCSI, NVMe/TCP, NFS, and S3 APIs.
  4. Driving POC testing and supplier management, including RFP development and vendor evaluation, assessing emerging technologies in All-Flash arrays, Software-Defined Storage (SDS), and distributed Object storage.
  5. Developing Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC) automation to provide "Storage-as-a-Service," enabling self-service provisioning, automated tiering, and policy-driven data protection.

Skills

Required

  • Bachelor's degree or four or more years of work experience.
  • Eight or more years of relevant experience required, demonstrated through one or a combination of work and/or military experience, or specialized training.
  • Experience in infrastructure engineering, with a heavy focus on enterprise storage planning, architecture, and performance tuning.
  • In-depth technical knowledge of Block (iSCSI, NVMe/TCP), File (NFS), and Object (S3) storage protocols.
  • Experience with Linux operating system (preferably Red Hat, though Ubuntu and SUSE are also acceptable).
  • Solid understanding of network protocols and transport layers, coupled with excellent troubleshooting skills.
  • Strong knowledge of cloud-native storage, automated provisioning, PVC migration, load balancing across multiple storage backends, and interoperability with Operations and maintenance teams.
  • Ability to lead on block storage protocols; help lead storage and array qualification, performance/benchmark testing, running PoCs, and full understanding of storage and data lifecycle management; assist in storage forecasting, budgeting, and purchasing.
  • Experience developing RFPs and leading vendor evaluations, with the ability to articulate technical trade-offs and recommendations to both engineering teams and business stakeholders.
  • Experience with storage monitoring and observability tooling, supporting Day 2 operations including capacity planning, alerting, and performance analysis in a private cloud environment.

Nice to have

  • Experience with enterprise-grade storage such as NetApp ONTAP (FabricPool/S3), Ceph (RBD/RGW), Dell ECS/PowerScale, Pure FlashArray, or quivalent.
  • Proficiency in Kubernetes Storage Class design and OpenStack storage service integration at scale.
  • Knowledge of automated tiering strategies—moving data between high-performance Flash (HOT tier) and cost-effective (WARM tier) Cloud/Object storage.
  • Experience using Ansible, CI/CD, Terraform, Python, Go or Bash to automate storage fabric configuration and volume management.
  • Understanding of how storage architectures interact with Virtual Network Functions (VNF) and software-defined fabrics.
  • Familiarity with data-at-rest and in-flight encryption, Key Management System (KMS), certificates, WORM (Write Once Read Many) for compliance, and multi-tenant isolation in a private cloud.

What the JD emphasized

  • Eight or more years of relevant experience required
  • Experience in infrastructure engineering, with a heavy focus on enterprise storage planning, architecture, and performance tuning.
  • In-depth technical knowledge of Block (iSCSI, NVMe/TCP), File (NFS), and Object (S3) storage protocols.
  • Ability to lead on block storage protocols; help lead storage and array qualification, performance/benchmark testing, running PoCs, and full understanding of storage and data lifecycle management; assist in storage forecasting, budgeting, and purchasing.
  • Experience developing RFPs and leading vendor evaluations, with the ability to articulate technical trade-offs and recommendations to both engineering teams and business stakeholders.