Lead Infrastructure Engineer / Architect – M&A

Lead Infrastructure Migration Engineer / Architect – M&A

£500 per day | Outside IR35 | 6-Month Contract

Remote – Extensive European Travel Required | Expenses Paid

We’re looking for a Lead Infrastructure Migration Engineer / Architect to join a major European M&A integration programme spanning 13 entities, 37 sites and approximately 1,000 users .

This is not a traditional project management role . We’re looking for someone with strong hands-on technical infrastructure and architecture experience who can lead complex migration activity across multiple organisations, sites and technology environments.

You’ll act as the technical lead across discovery, infrastructure assessment, migration planning, site readiness, cutover and post-migration stabilisation, working across Azure, Microsoft 365, networking, servers, EUC, identity and security .

What you'll be doing

• Lead technical discovery and assessment of infrastructure environments across multiple European entities and sites.
• Own the technical planning and coordination of infrastructure migration waves, cutovers, rollback and hypercare.
• Assess current-state environments and define technical requirements for the target architecture.
• Work across Azure, Microsoft 365, Entra ID, Active Directory, Intune, networking, servers, endpoints and security .
• Lead technical discussions with infrastructure engineers, architects, local IT teams and third-party suppliers.
• Assess site readiness covering LAN/WAN, Wi-Fi, VPN, connectivity, devices, servers, cloud dependencies, telephony and meeting-room technology .
• Identify technical blockers, dependencies and risks and drive them through to resolution.
• Provide technical leadership during migration and cutover activities, ensuring business continuity and minimal user disruption.
• Produce and review technical migration plans, architecture documentation, runbooks, readiness assessments and rollback plans.
• Act as the technical escalation point between the programme, engineering teams, acquired organisations and suppliers.

What we're looking for

• Strong background as a Lead Infrastructure Engineer, Infrastructure Architect, Technical Lead or Migration Lead .
• Proven experience delivering complex infrastructure migrations, integrations or M&A programmes .
• Strong hands-on technical knowledge of Microsoft Azure and associated infrastructure services .
• Strong understanding of Microsoft 365, Entra ID, Active Directory, Intune and Windows endpoints .
• Solid infrastructure knowledge across LAN, WAN, Wi-Fi, VPN, DNS, DHCP, servers, cloud and connectivity .
• Experience leading technical teams and third-party suppliers in complex, matrix environments.
• Strong understanding of migration architecture, technical dependencies, cutover, rollback and hypercare.
• Excellent troubleshooting and problem-solving skills, with the ability to identify technical blockers before they impact delivery.
• Comfortable operating at both architectural and hands-on delivery level .
• Excellent communication skills and confidence working with engineers, architects, suppliers and senior stakeholders.
• Extensive European travel is mandatory.

Desirable

• Previous experience delivering M&A infrastructure integrations or multi-country migrations .
• Azure Migrate, Azure Monitor, Azure Backup or Azure Site Recovery experience.
• Microsoft 365 tenant-to-tenant migration and identity consolidation experience.
• ServiceNow and ITIL/service transition experience.
• Microsoft Azure certifications such as AZ-104 or equivalent.
• Additional European language capability.

The opportunity

This is a highly visible technical leadership role within a large-scale European infrastructure integration programme. You’ll have significant ownership across the technical migration lifecycle and will be expected to lead from the front , challenge technical assumptions and drive complex infrastructure migrations through to successful delivery.

Remote working with extensive travel across Europe.