What is Cloud Architect

A cloud architect is an IT professional who is responsible for overseeing a company’s cloud computing strategy. This includes cloud adoption plans, cloud application design, and cloud management and monitoring. Cloud architects oversee application architecture and deployment in cloud environments — including public cloud, private cloud and hybrid cloud. Additionally, they act as consultants to their organization and need to stay current on the latest trends and issues. Companies that hire cloud architects either use cloud services or are planning to move to the cloud.

Cloud architects may also be involved in the legal areas of cloud computing and may negotiate contracts and work with legal and procurement departments. Architects ensure service-level agreement requirements are met.

What skills does a need?

Cloud architects require a combination of soft, or non-technical skills, and technical skills to be successful. The soft skills necessary for cloud architects include the following:

• Program leadership. They should be able to organize and plan programs around an organization’s cloud implementation.
• Communication. Cloud architects should be able to communicate complex technical concepts to team members.
• Collaboration. They should be able to work effectively with other architecture team members and delegate responsibilities.
• Thought leadership. Cloud architects should be a change agent in their organization, suggesting ways to push the program forward.
• Change management. They should be adaptable and be able to plan for and carry out changes in the program.
• The hard skills necessary for a cloud architect include the following:
• Application architecture. Cloud architects should be able to coordinate different applications together in the cloud environment.
• Orchestration. They should use automation for maintenance of certain areas of cloud infrastructure.
• Governance. Cloud architects should be able to handle benefits and risks when implementing key management points in cloud operations and set boundaries with competing organizational interests.
• Virtualization. Architects should be able to understand how to provision virtual machines efficiently and integrate them with cloud technologies.
• Security. They should be able to design infrastructure with enterprise data security and identity and access management in mind. This will ensure that only authorized people or code can access applications.
• Operating system (OS) knowledge. Architects must understand the spectrum of OSes that exist in the complex enterprise cloud ecosystem. Examples include Windows, Solaris, Linux and Ubuntu.
• Networking. Cloud architects should understand domain name system, TCP/IP and HTTP. They should also understand the infrastructure of main cloud providers like Azure, Google Cloud and Amazon Web Services.
• Programming languages. Many cloud architects have a significant software development background which often includes languages like Java, Python or C#.
• Finance. Architects should understand the costs of different services and implementations and be able to balance those costs.
• Big data. They should understand big data architecture and design principles.

Salary of cloud architect in India

Name Average Annual Salary

TCS (4-16 yrs exp)  ₹ 6.0L-₹ 15.9L-₹ 31.0L

Accenture (3-17 yrs exp)  ₹ 9.0L-₹ 21.3L-₹ 32.0L

Wipro (6-18 yrs exp ) ₹ 13.0L-₹ 23.1L-₹ 35.0L

Cognizant (3-16 yrs exp) ₹ 8.5L-₹ 18.6L-₹ 29.4L

IBM (10-19 yrs exp) ₹ 15.5L-₹ 26.8L-₹ 38.0L

Capgemini (7-16 yrs exp)  ₹ 12.5L-₹ 19.4L-₹ 30.7L

Tech Mahindr (2-18 yrs exp ) ₹ 4.0L-₹ 17.6L-₹ 32.0L

HCLTech (8-18 yrs exp ) ₹ 12.0L-₹ 21.9L-₹ 36.0L

Infosys (5-16 yrs exp ) ₹ 8.0L-₹ 17.8L-₹ 26.8L

Oracle (5-18 yrs exp ) ₹ 18.5L-₹ 31.0L-₹ 46.0L

Required skills

Cloud architects are projected to be the second most in-demand tech job in 2023.This role is responsible for designing and developing advanced cloud-based solutions for organizations migrating their existing workloads and infrastructure to the AWS cloud. Using AWS, cloud architects have limitless virtual resources, which can be quickly provisioned and disposed. It can be overwhelming; there are many services you need to become familiar with and, on top of that, having infrastructure and data in the cloud can become a security nightmare if not handled correctly. Here are seven skills cloud architects need to rock this in-demand role.

1. Java, Python or C#

Most architects have a software development background. An efficient AWS architect should be able to write code in Java, Python, C# or any other of the programming languages which have an official AWS SDK. Understanding programming in general is important for creating viable, logical solutions that would work as intended. And a good architect can use programming to quickly create a proof of concept or demo to show a point or investigate how to use the latest and greatest technologies.

2. Networking

It’s hard to create a secure, scalable cloud-based solution without understanding networking. DNS, TCP/IP, HTTP, CDN and VPN are only a few of the terms you want to make yourself familiar with. That doesn’t mean you need to know the port that you need to open for SSH access (although it helps). As an architect you’re expected to be able to use services such as Route 53 (DNS), CloudFront (CDN) and Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) to design your cloud networking using public and private subnets, internet access and VPC peering.

3. Data storage fundamentals

Every software architect needs to know and understand how and when to use databases. In AWS, where you have many data storage options available, you need to be able to know when to use each. From simple, yet powerful, bucket storage using S3 to Relational Database Service (RDS) and all the way to full fledged Hadoop clusters, you’ll need to compare different capabilities, performance and price, and choose the best way to store some or all of your company’s data.

4. Security foundations

From securing access to your AWS account to securing access to your data, AWS has several services and guidelines created specifically to help you make sure only authorized code and people are allowed to perform specific tasks. You will also need to learn about Identity and Access Management (IAM), a service that will help you define which services and users can access which resources. Learn how to secure your networks using Security Groups and Access Control Lists.

5. AWS service selection

Cloud architecture involves front-end and back-end technologies backed by components provided by a cloud vendor, in many cases Amazon. Good cloud architects should know what services are at their disposal and have a good understanding of the services relevant to the organization. This is no easy task since Amazon tends to release new services throughout the year. Knowing what to focus on is crucial. Basic services every AWS architect should know include SQS (simple queuing), SNS (notifications) and RDS (Relational Database Service). Knowledge of more specific ones—such as one of the AWS IoT related services—is extra helpful.

6. Cloud-specific patterns and technologies

Once you move code into the cloud some rules change. Scalability, availability and recovery become easy—as long as you design your workloads and harness AWS infrastructure correctly.

Using messages, storing state in the right place and handling failures correctly are a big part of creating scalable and cost-effective applications. Patterns such as pub/sub, queuing and eventual consistency will help you create applications that can be scaled by creating more instances of the same service.

On top of that you’ll need to choose between single applications to services or go serverless using AWS Lambda—all of which could provide cost-effective and performant solutions, depending on your needs.

7. Communication

Designing great architecture doesn’t mean a thing if you fail to explain your vision to software developers, managers and fellow architects. You’ll need to learn to explain your ideas via emails, documents and presentations in a way that convinces your team why your solution is the best. Work on your presentation skills, learn how to write in a clear and concise way and use a diagramming tool to show complex environments. A single slide with a diagram is preferable to ten slides with twenty bullet points each.

Job Role in Cloud Architect

A Cloud Architect creates and maintains the cloud computing architecture that all organizations require in order to be flexible as well as adaptable. The cloud architect is the person who has the expertise and skills to design cloud solutions that meet and surpass the organization’s needs. In today’s corporate world, the cloud is prevalent, and due to Cloud Architects, more and more businesses are realizing their full potential.

While the Cloud Architect will be working with cloud architectures, as the job title indicates, the architect will have a wide range of roles to fulfill. Here are some of the job roles that a Cloud Architect has:

1. AWS Specialist: A cloud expert who spends their time designing secure internet protocols and keeping AWS security services and features up to date is known as AWS Specialist.

2. Azure Cloud Architect: An IT expert who assists in the design, implementation and management of an Azure cloud environment is known as Azure Cloud Architect.

3. Service Cloud Architect: The entire cloud computing services and solutions that are deployed in and across the limits of a corporate business network are defined by the Service Cloud Architect. The person in charge is in charge of diagnosing, analyzing, designing, deploying, and integrating cloud services, allowing enterprises to run their operations in the cloud. The fundamental business needs are considered by the Service Cloud Architect, who then aligns them with a viable cloud solution.

4. AWS Cloud Solutions Architect: The AWS cloud solutions architect is in charge of implementing and securing AWS technologies. The individual applies his or her knowledge and abilities to assist in the development of sophisticated cloud-based solutions and the migration of existing workloads to the cloud.

5. Solutions Architect: The person who organizes the development effort of a systems solution is known as a solutions architect. The solutions architect is in charge of creating the overarching vision that underpins the proposed solution and transforming that vision into the solution via execution..

Conclusion : Cloud architects play a vital role in the successful adoption and utilization of cloud technologies. They possess a deep understanding of cloud platforms, services, and best practices, enabling them to design and optimize cloud-based architectures that meet the organization’s needs. By leveraging their expertise, cloud architects can help organizations achieve cost-efficiency, flexibility, and agility by migrating and managing workloads in the cloud.

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