As per a report given by livemint.com, the cloud computing industry is said to grow to a market size of 7.3 billion in 2022. Post pandemic, every business today is looking to move their business into public or private, or hybrid cloud infrastructure.The cloud computing sector is expanding as more businesses consider the advantages of using cloud services in their day-to-day functioning. The global cloud computing market had an economic value estimate of $266 billion in 2019, as claimed by Grand View Research, and the recent trend towards remote work due to the COVID-19 pandemic is predicted to raise cloud usage by another 59 percent worldwide.
It’s not surprising that people are more enthusiastic about cloud computing jobs because of this trend. TechRepublic recognized cloud engineering as one of the most in-demand tech occupations of the year in 2019. Cloud engineering is an engaging career for IT experts who wish to change their jobs as well as for beginners starting their career into the sector, with results in a good income, flexibility to work remotely, and much more.
As more businesses are commuting crucial operations and applications to public, private, and hybrid cloud infrastructures, cloud engineers—i.e., specialists responsible for reviewing an organization’s architecture and moving well-defined activities to a cloud-based system are in significant demand. With a mixture of technical abilities, business understanding, and expertise in at least one of the prime cloud providers such as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform, these people build, maintain, and connect to cloud services.
Who is a Cloud Engineer?
A cloud engineer is an IT professional who is responsible for carrying out all kinds of technical activities related to cloud computing such as designing, planning, managing, maintaining and supporting a company’s existing infrastructure and exploring substitutes for moving various functions such as database storage to a cloud-based system. From migration to maintenance, a cloud engineer sees to it that everything runs smoothly on the cloud.
In fact, cloud engineer is a general term that is used in the industry to cover a handful of roles related to cloud computing. Each of these roles have more specific responsibilities, depending on the company:
- Cloud Security Engineer: This role focuses on ensuring that the cloud environment is safe from any kind of malicious practices.
- Cloud Systems engineer: This role takes care of the infrastructure of the cloud environment and ensures it is well maintained.
- Cloud network engineer: This role is an extension of the system engineer and is responsible for maintaining the network infrastructure.
- Cloud software engineer: Cloud software engineers look after the softwares used for cloud computing.
- Cloud architect: Cloud architects work closely with the other cloud roles to design cloud environments and ensure a smooth migration to the cloud.
Cloud Engineer Job Role and Responsibilities
The rise in demand for Cloud Engineers and the way Cloud Computing has progressed over the past few years is nothing but a miracle. It’s not surprising, that the role continues to gain attention among employers.
The role of a cloud engineer is dependent on the terms you service, your position as a Cloud Engineer may differ. You can perform the following tasks:
- Engineer for Cloud Security
- Engineer in charge of systems (Cloud)
- Developer for the Cloud
- Architect for the Cloud
- Engineer, Network (Cloud)
The following are the three major categories:
- Architect of Solutions
- Developer for the Cloud
- Engineer for System Operations
- Architect of Solutions –
These are the employees who will be looking into infrastructure and application development. As a result, considerable technical skills and experience in creating distributed applications and systems on the Cloud platform are essential. In simple words, they are responsible for drawing out blueprints for application designs.
Some of their responsibilities are as follows:
To design and implement cloud-based applications that are dynamically scalable, available, maintainable, fault-tolerant, and dependable.
To choose the right Cloud services to create and deploy an app depending on the requirements.
To use Cloud Platforms to migrate complex, multi-tier apps.
On Cloud Platforms, designing and deploying enterprise-wide scale-able operations.
To bring up the cost-cutting measures in place.
2. Cloud Developer –
The term makes it distinct that these employees are responsible for coding and application development. They should be experts in cloud architecture. Cloud developers work on cloud-based application development, deployment, and debugging. They should be aware of :
- At least one high-level programming language.
- Cloud application implement, deployment, and debugging skills
- Writing applications claims knowledge of various APIs, command-line interfaces, and SDKs.
- Command over Cloud Service Providers’ are the Key Features
- Management of the application life cycle is something that you should be aware of.
3. Systems Engineer Operations –
They are the system administrators who control the application after it has been planned and executed. They are responsible for managing and keeping track of the activities that take place during the development process. They should be capable of performing the following tasks:
- Worked as a systems administrator in systems operations with admissible experience.
- Experience in tracking and computing systems.
- Ability to cope up with virtualization technology.
- Networking concepts such as DNS, TCP/IP, and firewalls are essential.
- Ability to describe architectural requirements.
- Scalable and fault-tolerant systems can be deployed, managed, and operated.
- Understand how to execute and manage data flow to and from a service provider.
Objectives of this Role
- Work in tandem with our engineering team to identify and implement the most optimal cloud-based solutions for the company
- Define and document best practices and strategies regarding application deployment and infrastructure maintenance
- Provide guidance, thought leadership, and mentorship to development teams to build cloud competencies
- Ensure application performance, uptime, and scale, maintaining high standards of code quality and thoughtful design
- Managing cloud environments in accordance with company security guidelines
- Daily and Monthly Responsibilities
- Develop and implement technical efforts to design, build, and deploy AWS applications at the direction of lead architects, including large-scale data processing, computationally intensive statistical modeling, and advanced analytics
- Participate in all aspects of the software development life cycle for AWS solutions, including planning, requirements, development, testing, and quality assurance
- Troubleshoot incidents, identify root cause, fix and document problems, and implement preventive measures
- Educate teams on the implementation of new cloud-based initiatives, providing associated training as required
- Employ exceptional problem-solving skills, with the ability to see and solve issues before they affect business productivity
Cloud Engineer Required Skills and Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree in computer science, information technology, or mathematics
- 3+ years of experience architecting, designing, developing, and implementing cloud solutions on AWS platforms
- Understanding of and experience with the five pillars of a well-architected frameworks
- Experience in several of the following areas: database architecture, ETL, business intelligence, big data, machine learning, advanced analytics
- Proven ability to collaborative with multi-disciplinary teams of business analysts, developers, data scientists, and subject matter experts
- AWS certifications are a plus
- Knowledge of web services, API, REST, and RPC
Cloud Engineer Skills
If you aspire to become a cloud engineer, you should acquire these following skills. Recruiters are looking for these essential skills in the candidates they look to hire.
- Programming Skills: You should be proficient in programming languages such as PHP, Java, .NET and more as you will use them frequently for scaling web applications. Python and Ruby are also among the most popular programming languages among cloud developers.
- Linux: An open source operating system, Linux has become an integral part of cloud computing in recent years. Since it is open source, developers don’t need to worry about permissions and can easily customize their programs to meet the needs of business. The secure nature of Linux also adds to its benefits, making Linux rise in popularity. Cloud engineers are often required to architect, administer, and maintain linux based servers. Interested candidates should consider getting the Linux Foundation Certified Systems Administrator (LFCS) certification.
- Database Skills: Data is the driving force behind modern business. Exponential amount of data is getting generated on a daily basis. Modern business uses this data to gain insights and grow. To accommodate this data explosion, and store, manage and access this data better, database management skills are essential. Since cloud provides cost effective storage solutions, cloud engineers are required to be well versed in database management skills. MySQL and Hadoop are among the most used query languages for database management.
- API and Web Services: Knowledge of APIs and web services can come in handy for integrating web applications. Open standards such as XML, WSDL, SOAP, and UDDI are used to tag, transfer, and describe data; the API helps to secure the integration process.
- Networking: Knowledge of virtual networks is necessary while working with large organizations since they often integrate network management functions into the cloud. Cloud engineers should know how to create and maintain responsive networks to deliver a smooth end-user experience.
- Cloud Service Providers: It is essential to be acquainted with Google, Microsoft or AWS cloud service providers as companies are most likely to use one of these. If you want to pursue cloud computing, get a certification done in one of the cloud service providers. An AWS certification will help you understand the cloud techniques ranging from computing, storage, database, migration and more.
Cloud Engineer Salary Trends in 2021
If you wish to gain insights about your current salary and learn how it can grow over the span of 5-10 years, plan your career success and find out how you can earn more.
Based Experience Level
Experience Level | Salary |
Beginner (1-2 years) | ₹ 5,40,000 PA |
Mid-Senior (5-8 years) | ₹ 10,00,000 PA |
Expert (10-15 years) | ₹ 21,00,000 PA |
*source: Glassdoor
Based on Company Size
Size | Salary Range |
Amazon | ₹ 8,00,000 – 20,82,522 PA |
Syngenta | ₹ 25,39,456 – 27,27,071 PA |
IBM | ₹ 4,00,000 – 26,09,744 PA |
Based on location
Job Location | Salary |
Karnataka | ₹9,14,687 |
Pune | ₹8,51,481 |
Delhi | ₹ 6,00,000 |
Kerela | ₹5,57,183 |
Tamilnadu | ₹1,317,345 |
Based on Skills
Skills | Salary |
IT Security and Infrasturcture | ₹1,228,902 |
Amazon Web Services | ₹9,00,000 |
Cloud Computing | ₹894,979 |
Linux | ₹874896 |
Microsoft Azure | ₹825043 |