Summary of the role

ECMWF as a research & operational organization is participating in many activities pertaining to Cloud Computing and related technologies. ECWMF also offers a Cloud Computing service and make available cloud resources close to its data and existing HPC and storage infrastructure, in order to facilitate a proximity computation to its enormous data repository. Therefore ECMWF is participating in a number of Innovation Action (IA) and Research and Innovation Action (RIA) European Commission (EC) funded projects like EO4EU and BUILDSPACE.

The EO4EU project (https://www.eo4eu.eu/) will provide innovative tools, methodologies and approaches that assist a wide spectrum of users, from domain experts and professionals to simple citizens to benefit from Earth Observation (EO) data. EO4EU envisages to boost the Earth Observation data market, providing a digestible data information model for a wide range of EO data, through dynamic data annotation and a state-of-the-art serverless processing by leveraging important European Cloud & HPC infrastructures. ECMWF has the technical management and leads one of the six work packages of the project.

BUILDSPACE is a recently started project which aims to couple terrestrial data from buildings (collected by IoT platforms, Building Information Modelling (BIM) solutions and other) with aerial imaging from drones equipped with thermal cameras and location annotated data from satellite services (i.e., EGNSS and Copernicus) to deliver innovative services for the building and urban stakeholders and support informed decision making towards energy-efficient buildings and climate resilient cities. The platform will allow integration of these heterogeneous data and will offer services at building scale, enabling the generation of high fidelity multi-modal digital twins and at city scale providing decision support services for energy demand prediction, urban heat and urban flood analysis. The services will enable the identification of environmental hotspots that increase pressure to local city ecosystems and raise probability for natural disasters (such as flooding) and will issue alerts and recommendations for action to local governments and regions (such as the support of policies for building renovation in specific vulnerable areas). ECMWF participates in many project tasks and leads the technology synchronization and instigation of potential exploitation of the project results within ECMWF related activities like Copernicus services (CAMS, C3S) and Destination Earth.

The successful candidate will apply their skills, knowledge, and expertise to help achieving these goals, complete the deliverables of the EO4EU and BUILDSPACE projects and also contribute to other related activities within the organization. It is anticipated that the duties for this position may change and evolve over time, to address the changing Cloud Computing needs of ECMWF and its Member States.

About ECMWF

ECMWF is the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts. It is an intergovernmental organisation created in 1975 by a group of European nations and is today supported by 35 Member and Co-operating States, mostly in Europe. The Centre’s mission is to serve and support its Member and Co-operating States and the wider community by developing and providing world-leading global numerical weather prediction. ECMWF functions as a 24/7 research and operational centre with a focus on medium and long-range predictions and holds one of the largest meteorological archives in the world. The success of its activities relies primarily on the talent of its scientists, strong partnerships with its Member and Co-operating States and the international community, some of the most powerful supercomputers in the world, and the use of innovative technologies such as machine learning across its operations.

Over the years, ECMWF has also developed a strong partnership with the European Union, and for the past seven years has been an entrusted entity for the implementation and operation of the Climate and the Atmosphere Monitoring Services of the EU Copernicus Programme, as well as a contributor to the Copernicus Emergency Management Service. The collaboration does not stop there and includes other areas of work, including High Performance Computing and the development of digital tools that enable ECMWF to extend its provision of data and products covering weather, climate, air quality, fire and flood prediction and monitoring.

ECMWF is a multi-site organisation, with its headquarters based in Reading, UK, a new data centre in Bologna, Italy, and a large presence in Bonn, Germany. For additional details, see www.ecmwf.int.

About Platforms and Services

The Platforms and Services Section forms part of ECMWF’s Computing Department, and is responsible for delivering a wide range of services including mission-critical virtual and bare-metal server infrastructure, data centre and wide area networks, security, monitoring and analytics, enterprise ICT, as well as the toolchain to support software development, integration and testing, and automated deployment for in-house or community software developers.

Main duties and responsibilities

• Actively contributing to EO4EU and BUILSPACE projects e.g. prepare reports, deliverables, dissemination and technology transfer activities of the projects.
• Representing ECMWF in meetings with project members, partners, vendors, and at international technical conferences.
• Contributing to the formulation of the high-level design and implementation principles to enable the projects to achieve their objectives.
• Promoting technical innovation and reliable, robust service delivery within the (R)IA projects and the organisation.
• Contributing to maintaining and troubleshooting issues on cloud IaaS, PaaS and SaaS deployments of the projects and resolving complex problems relating to cloud and storage with a particular focus on stability and performance.

Personal attributes

• Strong interpersonal and communication skills, particularly listening to and respecting the views of others
• Strong technical project management related to EC-funded projects and the enthusiasm to tackle challenging research questions when working with complex technical tools and willingness to learn new algorithms, technologies, and methodologies
• Ability to work in a team at ECMWF towards a common goal in interdisciplinary research projects
• Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills with an independent and proactive approach, together with an interest in identifying, investigating, and solving technical challenges

Education, experience, knowledge and skills (including language)

Education

• university degree, or equivalent, in a discipline related to computer science, physics, mathematics, or engineering is required

Experience

• Technical and management skills are required for this post, with demonstrated relevant experience
• Strong technical project management skills with emphasis on Cloud computing and related technologies
• Experience in EC project management (either as work package or task leader level) and project proposal preparation and coordination

Knowledge and skills (including language)

Good understanding of the following is essential:

• Cloud/cloud-native technologies and different service models (IaaS, PaaS and SaaS)
• Event-driven and microservices based design concepts and related technologies like Container and orchestration technologies (e.g., Kubernetes)
• Infrastructure automation and virtualisation technologies
• Accounting, monitoring and reporting tools in cloud environments
• Experience on project management methodologies and frameworks (e.g, Agile, Waterfall, Kanban) and on ITIL processes and principles
• Languages Candidates must be able to work effectively in English, and interviews will be conducted in English

Other information

Grade remuneration

The successful candidates will be recruited at the A2 grade, according to the scales of the Co-ordinated Organisations and the annual basic salary will be GBP 68,374 (Reading), EUR 83,888 (Bonn) or EUR 70,794 (Bologna) NET of income tax.. ECMWF also offers a generous benefits package, including a flexible teleworking policy. This vacancy is for one position assigned to the employment category STF-PL as defined in the ECMWF Staff Regulations. Full details of salary scales and allowances are available on the ECMWF website at www.ecmwf.int/en/about/jobs, including the ECMWF Staff Regulations and the terms and conditions of employment.

Starting date: As soon as possible.

Length of contract: ​​​​​​​Approximately 30 months up to 31 January 2026

Location: The position can be based at Reading, UK, Bonn, Germany or Bologna, Italy

As a multi-site organisation, ECMWF has adopted a hybrid organisation model which allows flexibility to staff to mix office working and teleworking. Successful applicants and members of their family forming part of their households will be exempt from immigration restrictions.

Videoconference interviews (via Microsoft Teams) are expected to take place in May 2023.

Who can apply

Applicants are invited to complete the online application form by clicking on the apply button below.

At ECMWF, we consider an inclusive environment as key for our success. We are dedicated to ensuring a workplace that embraces diversity and provides equal opportunities for all, without distinction as to race, gender, age, marital status, social status, disability, sexual orientation, religion, personality, ethnicity and culture. We value the benefits derived from a diverse workforce and are committed to having staff that reflect the diversity of the countries that are part of our community, in an environment that nurtures equality and inclusion.

Applications are invited from nationals from ECMWF Member States and Co operating States, listed below, and all EU states:

Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Georgia, Hungary, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Montenegro, Morocco, the Netherlands, Norway, North Macedonia, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and the United Kingdom.

In these exceptional times, we also welcome applications from Ukrainian nationals for this vacancy.

Applications from nationals from other countries may be considered in exceptional cases.