Applications are invited from suitably qualified candidates for a full‑time, fixed‑term position as a Senior Software Performance Engineer with the Irish Centre for High‑End Computing (ICHEC) at the University of Galway, Ireland.
The position is available immediately to contract end date 31-Dec-2027, with flexibility to work from our Dublin or Galway offices.
Irish Centre for High‑End Computing (ICHEC)
ICHEC is Ireland's national centre for High‑Performance Computing (HPC) providing digital infrastructure capabilities and expertise through R&D engagements and skills development programmes to academia, industry and public sector organisations.
With a highly ambitious leading‑edge Strategy for Advanced Computing (HPC, Data, AI, Quantum) in Ireland and Europe, ICHEC provides infrastructure services and expertise in HPC and data platforms to for computational sciences, AI, high performance data analytics, Earth Observation, quantum computing and cybersecurity across several sectors including environmental informatics, life sciences, deeptech/material sciences, urban sciences, and other disciplines.
ICHEC works in close partnership with national and international researchers, enterprises and public authorities for joint R&D, skills development, and provisioning HPC and data services to accelerate their digital transformation and green transition.
Salary: Research Fellow salary scale €65,889 - €86,014 per annum, (subject to the project's funding limitations), and pro rata for shorter and/or part‑time contracts.
The default position for all new public sector appointments is the 1st point of the salary scale. This may be reviewed, and consideration afforded to appointment at a higher point on the payscale (subject to the project's funding limitations), where evidence of prior years' equivalent experience is accepted in determining placement on the scale above point 1, subject to the maximum of the scale.
Closing date for receipt of applications is 17:00 (Irish Time) on January 5, 2025. It will not be possible to consider applications received after the closing date.
Interviews are planned to be held during the w/c January 19, 2025.
*Please review full job description for further details and essential requirement
JOB DESCRIPTION
The Senior Software Platform Engineer will play a central role in developing, maintaining and supporting the AI‑related software infrastructure of the AI Factory Antenna in Ireland (AIF IRL‑Antenna). This includes building software and platform components to enable AI workloads on sovereign and federated infrastructure. The engineer will ensure robust, user‑friendly, and reproducible environments for AI users from startup/SME to enterprise, public sector and research communities.
Duties:
Key responsibilities include the following:
- Provide technical leadership, guidance and mentorship to members in the ICHEC Platform Engineering Team.
- Develop, deploy and maintain AI development platforms and environments on:
- The AI Factory IRL‑Antenna sovereign infrastructure
- Linked EuroHPC AI Factory infrastructures in France and Luxembourg.
- EU‑based commercial cloud resources.
- Implement resource management, workflow orchestration, and automation pipelines (Kubernetes, Docker, CI/CD, MLOps).
- Build and maintain reusable software infrastructure for AI‑type resource management, workflows, and MLOps, ensuring reproducibility and performance optimisation.
- Integrate and maintain performance monitoring, logging, and system reliability tooling.
- Support software reusability, version control, and automation through containerisation and DevOps best practices.
- Work closely with Customer Success Managers (CSMs) and technical teams to onboard, guide, and troubleshoot customer projects.
- Prepare user‑facing documentation, platform usage guides, and operational FAQs.
This position is for an experienced highly motivated problem‑solver, with a creative and analytical mind, who is excited to build new solutions that will have a global impact.
Eligibility Requirements
- A Master's degree in Computer Science, Engineering or related field with at least 10 years of experience in software development, software platform or infrastructure engineering, DevOps.
- Proficiency in many of the following:
- Containerisation and orchestration (Docker, Kubernetes).
- Monitoring, observability, and configuration management.
- Working in cloud and/or hybrid computing environments.
- Strong knowledge of GIT‑style version control and CI/CD approaches.
- Proven ability in software system design, with distributed systems a plus.
- MLOps and workflow tools (GitLab CI, MLflow, Airflow, etc.).
- Knowledge of AI/ML frameworks (TensorFlow, PyTorch).
- Working knowledge of Identity & Access Management (e.g., LDAP, SSO, OAuth2).
- Linux systems administration and automation (Ansible, SaltStack, Terraform, etc.).
- Experience using distributed computing products and platforms such as Airflow, Spark, Kafka etc.
- Familiarity with GDPR‑compliant data environments and data governance principles an advantage.
- Examples of personal GitHub projects or contributions to open‑source projects an advantage.
Continuing Professional Development
Researchers at University of Galway are encouraged to avail of a range of training and development opportunities designed to support their personal career development plans. University of Galway provides continuing professional development supports for all researchers seeking to build their own career pathways either within or beyond academia. Researchers are encouraged to engage with our Researcher Development Centre (RDC) upon commencing employment - see HERE for further information.
We reserve the right to re‑advertise or extend the closing date for this post.
University of Galway is an equal opportunities employer.
All positions are recruited in line with Open, Transparent, Merit (OTM) and Competency based recruitment.
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