Alexandru Gunescu-Head of Cloud Infrastructure

In my role as Senior Cloud DevOps Architect for BP, an oil and gas company, I had the mission to migrate the Electric Vehicle Charging platform of the EV Division from on-premises and Azure to AWS cloud, resulting in a hybrid multi-cloud, multi-tenant SaaS solution.

Deployment with Kubernetes for the application layer meant provisioning Kubernetes clusters managed by EKS and AKS, with a focus on integrating them into a multi-tenant environment. This integration was achieved by using Kubernetes namespaces and access controls to ensure data isolation and privacy enforcement.

In the database layer, we chose an RDS instance with PostgreSQL to support the backend infrastructure of our applications. Tenants shared the same RDS instance, but each had a dedicated schema.

To ingest near real-time data from physical charge points (CPOs), as IoT devices, via the OCPI protocol, we ran into significant delays with batch processing. As a result, we built a real-time streaming data pipeline using Apache Kafka, while prioritizing an event-driven architecture.

Led collaboration across multiple internal teams, external vendors, cloud providers, and on-site partners to integrate over five systems into a unified solution.

Achievements:

• Successfully designed and implemented hybrid multi-cloud solutions, integrating multiple cloud platforms (AWS, Azure) with on-premises infrastructure, using Site-to-Site VPNs, Firewalls, and Load Balancing.
• Led the migration of on-premises infrastructure to multi-cloud, multi-tenant infrastructure, resulting in 30% faster processing times.
• Migrated workloads from VMware and Hyper-V environments to cloud-based VMs, leveraging cloud-native services to optimize performance, cost efficiency, and scalability.
• Designed a multi-tenant Kubernetes platform leveraging the Kubernetes ecosystem, using Karpenter for dynamic EC2 node provisioning, KEDA for event-driven pod autoscaling (e.g., Kafka message lag), and Rancher for centralized monitoring of multiple clusters (EKS, AKS, or on-prem K8s), replacing Microsoft-centric Azure Arc management service.
• Designed and implemented Python-based FastAPI microservices as part of the EV core-backend on AWS EKS application layer, powering data ingestion and customer analytics pipelines.
• Developed asynchronous, event-driven APIs (Python-FastAPI) for real-time integration with CPOs, supporting OCPI 2.3 and OICP protocols.
• Designed and implemented a secure, production-grade Azure Databricks platform using Terraform, ensuring scalability and cost efficiency.
• Migrated on-premises ERP to a hybrid Dynamics 365 architecture with ERP hosted locally and CRM running in Azure, integrated via Azure Arc.
• Automated CI/CD pipelines for Databricks notebooks and jobs using GitHub Actions & Databricks CLI, reducing deployment time. Reduced infrastructure provisioning time by 70% by automating cloud resource deployment with GitOps.
• Ensured compliance with internal audit and data governance standards (GDPR) through OAuth2/OIDC-based authentication and fine-grained role-based access controls.
• Developed a Zero Trust security model, enforcing least-privilege access and microsegmentation, enhancing security posture and compliance with GDPR and NIST.
• Built interactive analytics dashboards in Amazon QuickSight, integrating data from S3 and Redshift to deliver real-time business insights and visualizations with embedded access for multi-tenant users.
• Led cloud security assessments and full-lifecycle cybersecurity integration during M&A, covering AWS, Azure, IAM (Entra ID), and data protection, while aligning security posture with NIST, ISO 27001, and GDPR across hybrid and cloud-native environments.
• Reduced cloud costs by 64% for a client's dev environment by implementing automated start/stop schedules for EC2 and RDS instances via AWS CDK with EventBridge Scheduler or AWS Systems Manager.

Tech stack:

• Infrastructure as Code: Terraform, AWS CDK, Ansible.
• Containers: Kubernetes on EKS, AKS, Docker.
• Streaming Data Processing: Kafka to Confluent Cloud, after AWS MSK.
• Frontend: TypeScript, React, NextJS, Hooks, Styled Components.
• Backend: Python with FastAPI, also Node.js with NestJS.
• Database: Aurora on PostgreSQL with TypeORM, RDS on SQL Server, Azure Databricks full setup and administration, ETL Pipelines.
• CI/CD and GitOps: GitHub Actions, Azure DevOps, ArgoCD.
• Monitoring and Observability: Prometheus and Grafana.
• Virtualization: Hyper-V, VMware Cloud on AWS, Azure Migrate.
• ERP Systems: Odoo, Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central on Azure, integrated with Azure Arc.
• Networking: Site-to-Site VPNs, AWS Direct Connect, Azure ExpressRoute, Firewalls (AWS Network Firewall, Azure Firewall).
• Security: IAM, NIST Framework, Zero Trust Security, AWS WAF, AWS Shield, GuardDuty.

As Lead Cloud Solution Architect for Brand Retail Execution at LEGO, I led application engineering teams responsible for the design, build, and operation of the Assortment Management platform on LEGO.com, the LEGO Group's flagship direct-to-consumer e-commerce platform.

I focused on leading, coaching, and mentoring engineers while driving innovation and a strong engineering culture across teams. Working closely with solution architects, engineers, and senior stakeholders, I defined the technical direction and ensured delivery of a world-class shopper experience.

I was accountable for end-to-end software engineering, composable cloud architecture, and operational excellence of highly available, low-latency distributed systems and global payment services running on AWS.

Responsibilities:

• Lead, coach, and mentor a team of application engineers, fostering a culture of innovation, continuous learning, and strong engineering practices.
• Define and oversee the composable solution architecture for the Assortment Management platform on LEGO.com, ensuring scalability and performance for a world-class shopper experience.
• Led the design and operation of Kubernetes platforms on AWS EKS, supporting highly available, low-latency microservices workloads.
• Manage the operational excellence and performance of the global online payment services platform and other e-commerce systems, ensuring stability and security.
• Designed and implemented Python-based FastAPI microservices.
• Ensured compliance with internal audit and data governance standards (GDPR, PCI DSS) through OAuth2/OIDC-based authentication and fine-grained role-based access controls.
• Develop and execute LEGO's cloud strategy, optimizing platform performance, scalability, and cost efficiency by leveraging AWS cloud services.
• Implement best practices for continuous monitoring, incident response, and system reliability to support global e-commerce operations.

Tech stack:

• IaC - AWS CDK, CloudFormation.
• Frontend: TypeScript, React, Context API, Hooks, Styled Components.
• Backend: Node.js, Python with FastAPI, GraphQL API layer on AppSync
• Databases: Aurora Serverless on PostgreSQL, DynamoDB.
• Containerization: AWS ECS/Fargate & AWS Lambda, Step Functions. Docker, Microservices architecture, Kubernetes on EKS, AKS.
• Distributed systems and event-driven Amazon SNS, SQS, EventBridge.
• Cloud services: AWS EC2, S3, RDS, Lambda, VPC, API Gateway, etc.
• CI/CD and GitOps: GitHub Actions, Azure DevOps, ArgoCD.
• Monitoring: Prometheus and Grafana for infrastructure monitoring.
• Payments: Stripe / PayPal for global payment processing.

As a Tech Lead, I was asked to help rebuild and refactor the front-end infrastructure of the E.ON platform in Munich. Until then, they had built their front ends with some frameworks and tools without any particular focus on consistency, resulting in a bloated and inconsistent codebase. That's why they asked me to lead the refactoring of their payment integration service, AEM author panel, and corporate website.

The project was split into several sub-projects and started with refactoring the client integration service (payment dialogs) in December 2016, followed by the user backend in January / February 2017 and the corporate website in March and April 2017. In 2017, the payment dialogs and user dashboards were completely redesigned and refactored with React, using Reflux as the architecture and a consistent, clear design.

We decided to use CSS modules instead of the previously used PureCSS framework to follow a lean codebase approach. This saved hundreds of kilobytes in total per project.

Projects: eon.de, mein.eon.de

Tech stack:

• Frontend: TypeScript, React, ReactNative, Redux, Styled Components,
• Mapping libraries: HighCharts, Leaflet, Jest.
• Backend: REST APIs, Node.js, GraphQL
• Apollo with Microservices architecture.
• Database: MongoDB Atlas.
• CI/CD: GitLab/Jenkins.
• IaC & Cloud Stack - Lambda, S3, CloudFront, Terraform,
• Docker, Kubernetes.

• Extended and customized ExtJS components, integrated grids with REST services, and addressed cross-browser issues
• Designed and implemented JavaScript solutions using ExtJS framework
• Created web widgets for large data volumes and improved UX with AJAX and web services
• Integrated multiple data sources and managed data migration, transformation, and scripting
• Deployed and managed Splunk for monitoring and analytics
• Mentored junior developers and liaised with clients to gather requirements