Lead Solution Architect API & Kong
Request ID:68261-1Title: Lead Solution Architect API & KongLocations: Atlanta, GADuration: 6 MonthsExperience Requested: 7+ YearsPay Range: $45.00-60.00/Hour on W2 (All inclusive)Applicant must be willing to work on W2.Job Description:We are seeking a seasoned Solution Architect to own the end-to-end architecture for Kong Konnect and Kong Gateway (Control Plane & Data Plane) across on-premises and GCP environments. This role will lead ARB reviews, define target architecture, oversee security, HADR, observability, and performance/scalability design. The candidate will define API governance standards, design-first approaches, and lifecycle management, collaborating closely with Security, Network, Infrastructure, and Product teams.Mandatory Technical Skills:Minimum 10 years in integration/API architecture, with experience in at least 2 enterprise API gateway programs.Deep expertise in Kong Konnect / Gateway architecture , including decK, declarative configuration, workspaces, and RBAC.Security patterns: mTLS, OAuth2/OIDC, JWT, API keys, rate limiting, WAF, secrets/cert management.Cloud and on-premises experience: GCP (VPC, load balancing), Linux, networking fundamentals.Observability integration: Dynatrace, logging, audit, and compliance controls.Strong knowledge of CI/CD and Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC) principles: Git, Git branching, Terraform pipelines.Good to Have Skills:Experience with Apigee to Kong migration programs and multi-org, multi-region topologies.SRE, chaos/resiliency patterns, and service mesh technologies (Istio, Linkerd).Cost/performance optimization and capacity sizing for high-TPS API gateways.Key Responsibilities:Own and design end-to-end API gateway architecture for Kong Konnect/Gateway across on-prem and cloud.Lead architectural reviews and ensure best practices in security, HADR, observability, and scalability.Define and enforce API governance, lifecycle management, and design-first approaches.Collaborate with Security, Network, Infra, and Product teams to ensure robust and compliant architecture.