System Design Authority

Location: Bristol (mostly remote with adhoc site visits at locations around the South Coast of the UK)

Duration: 3 month contract

Rate: -119ph LTD (Outside IR35)

Role details:

Our client, a leading defence company, are looking for a System Design Authority (SDA) to support on a key project alongside the UK Home Office. This role is critical in providing leadership and governance to support the solution''s development and ensure alignment with strategic objectives. This opportunity involves work outside regular office hours and site visits across the South Coast of the UK.

• Responsible for the end-to-end design and implementation of a key software system. This will include analysis and design, assisting with and governing software development and hosting, and achieving successful IT health checks, testing, and deployment.
• The design should be modular and, where possible, adopt existing products, technologies and subsystems.
• Responsibility for the management, tracking, and fulfilment of project progress, together with the preparation, updating and custody of the system/architectural specifications, drawings and other data associated with the design.
• Prepare appropriate certificate of design and its submission for acceptance.
• The role will require collaboration with existing port and system operators, suppliers, and support organisations to achieve alignment with concurrent changes being adopted in operations and systems.
• Responsibility for the integrity and suitability of the design and for leading the lifecycle management of the product, including design reviews, verification, and qualification activities, will also lie with the SDA.
• The system design will consist of the following:
  • Image Identification
  • Traffic Management System
• The system is expected to have a minimum effect on the ports'' traffic flow. This will likely require linking to the existing Port IT system & operations and working closely with a mobile high-energy X-ray system.

What we are looking for:

The SDA should have solid knowledge and experience in the disciplines involved in full lifecycle software and systems Engineering. In particular, they should have good experience in systems integration, with a strong emphasis on software-led integration, API design and implementation, and secure interoperability, alongside basic networking skills.

The successful candidate will have an outstanding range of knowledge and experience in integrating systems containing electronic, electrical, and mechanical components and sub-systems.

Specific knowledge and experience in one or more areas below will be advantageous.

• Defining and maintenance of architectural principles, patterns and frameworks
• Ensuring adherence to technical and security standards and identifying corrective action
• Advanced software architecture, API integration, and design for scalability
• Leadership in software-led systems integration, including cross-domain interoperability
• Formal methods for analysis and design
• Dynamically scaled containerisation such as those managed by Kubernetes
• Architectures for sharing databases between processes & locking strategies
• Linux platforms such as RHEL and/or Ubuntu
• System Administrator experience including patch management, monitoring e.g. SCOM, mitigating security vulnerabilities
• Secure by Design principles
• Design and implementation of CI/CD pipelines, with embedded DevSecOps practices
• Machine learning models for object detection / optical character recognition
• IT Networking
• In addition, experience with MS Office applications such as Word, Excel, Project etc is essential.

If you possess the skills and experience required for this exciting and challenging role, we would love to hear from you. Apply now to join our client''s highly specialised team in Bristol.