Software Architect

James Douglas Middle East is seeking an experienced Software Architect to join their client's technology hub in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. This is a senior individual contributor role focused on setting the technical direction for an industrial platform across mining, energy, and industrial operations.

The client is a fast-scaling organization building an industrial platform from their technology hub in Abu Dhabi. They are looking for a hands-on architect to own the platform architecture end-to-end, defining technical strategy and staying close to the build process.

If you have a strong engineering background and extensive experience in industrial domains, we encourage you to apply now.

Company Overview

James Douglas Middle East is a Dubai-based professional search and leadership advisory firm. As part of the EMA Global network, they specialize in delivering board-level and senior talent solutions across high-impact, high-growth industries, including Banking, Fintech, Healthcare, Digital, Consumer, Industrial, and Retail.

They leverage a Human + AI Advantage, combining psychometrics, AI tools, and structured search methodology, with deep national talent expertise and a strategic HQ in Dubai. They are a trusted partner for investor-backed mandates and work with organizations offering clarity in leadership hiring, discretion in execution, and speed in delivery.

Quick Details

• Salary Range: Not Specified
• Job Type: Full-time
• Experience: 10 Year+
• Qualifications: Bachelor's Degree

Key Responsibilities

• Define the target-state architecture, standards and reusable patterns for the platform across on-premise, cloud-native and hybrid environments.
• Design the streaming and ingestion layer for high-frequency time-series and event data.
• Architect integration with industrial systems: devices, gateways, PLCs, SCADA, historians and enterprise applications.
• Design secure data pipelines for model hosting, vector databases and real-time observability.
• Establish governance: safety frameworks, data privacy controls, cost optimisation and compliance.
• Work across product, engineering, operations, AI and security teams, and engage directly with customers and vendors on technical direction.

Requirements

• 15 or more years of experience, with around 10 at architect level.
• A hands-on engineering background before moving into architecture, with strong .NET and microservices foundations.
• Demonstrable experience in industrial domains – mining, metals, oil and gas, manufacturing or industrial automation.
• Experience with Apache Kafka and Kafka Streams, or equivalent streaming platforms.
• Experience with time-series data platforms such as InfluxDB, TimescaleDB or OSI PI.
• Familiarity with MQTT, OPC UA and industrial connector ecosystems.
• Experience with containerised deployment, API design and event-driven architecture.
• Evidence of owning a complete platform architecture rather than a single component or module.
• Bachelor's or master's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Data Engineering or a related field.

Benefits

• Exposure to applied AI on industrial data – LLM integration, agent frameworks, MCP, RAG pipelines or MLOps.
• Experience designing for multi-tenant and multi-client environments.
• Familiarity with industrial security standards such as IEC 62443.