5+ years in Data Engineering / Data Platform / AI Engineering / Advanced Analytics , ideally in large or regulated organisations. Proven experience designing and building cloud data platforms and data lakehouse architectures (preferably AWS ). Hands-on experience with Databricks or EMR for large-scale data transformation. Strong background in data ingestion and ETL . Experience with CDC-based pipelines and event-driven architectures for ingesting operational/transactional data. Experience integrating on-premise data lakes with cloud platforms in hybrid architectures . Experience enabling AI/ML solutions in production. Hands-on involvement in data governance, data quality, data rules and guardrails . Experience working with BI and business stakeholders on KPI design and data modelling for reporting/visualisation .