IS Specialist (Lead Java Architect)

Career Area: Technology, Digital and Data Job Description: Your Work Shapes the World at Caterpillar Inc.

When you join Caterpillar, you're joining a global team who cares not just about the work we do – but also about each other. We are the makers, problem solvers, and future world builders who are creating stronger, more sustainable communities. We don't just talk about progress and innovation here – we make it happen, with our customers, where we work and live. Together, we are building a better world, so we can all enjoy living in it.

Job Summary We are seeking an experienced IS Specialist (Lead Java Architect) to join our App Services for DT&D GCIO - CAT IT Division.

The preference for this role is to be based out of Bangalore – Caterpillar PSN / Chennai - WTC

This position requires candidate to work a 5-day -a -week schedule.

Shift Timing: 01:00-10:00PM IST

Job Location: Chennai or Bangalore

About Caterpillar Caterpillar Inc. is the world's leading manufacturer of construction and mining equipment, off-highway diesel and natural gas engines, industrial gas turbines, and diesel-electric locomotives. For nearly 100 years, we have been helping customers build a better, more sustainable world and are committed to contributing to a reduced-carbon future. Our innovative products and services, backed by our global dealer network, provide exceptional value that helps customers succeed. Job Summary The IS Specialist serves as a Lead Architect and Senior Technical Leader responsible for defining and driving the architecture, design, integration, security, quality, and modernization of complex enterprise applications . The role translates business requirements into scalable technology solutions, establishes architecture and engineering standards, and leads the design of secure, highly available, resilient, and maintainable enterprise applications. As an SG24 Individual Contributor, this position operates with a high degree of independence, solves complex cross-functional technology problems, influences engineering practices across teams, and coaches technical professionals. Job Responsibilities Architecture and Technical Leadership · Lead the high-level and detailed technical design of large-scale, business-critical enterprise applications, ensuring performance, scalability, availability, reliability, security, maintainability, and fault tolerance. · Define and evolve application architectures using modern engineering patterns, including microservices, modular architectures, event-driven architecture, APIs, asynchronous messaging, and cloud-native solutions. · Provide architecture guidance and technical coaching to engineers, technical leads, and development teams as a Lead Architect. · Provide technical leadership for complex, multi-technology solutions spanning applications, databases, infrastructure, integration platforms, cloud services, and enterprise systems. · Establish and promote architecture principles, technical standards, reference patterns, coding guidelines, and engineering best practices across development teams. · Evaluate emerging technologies, frameworks, tools, and architectural approaches and recommend adoption based on business value, technical feasibility, enterprise standards, cost, and risk. · Drive modernization of legacy applications by defining target-state architectures and pragmatic transition strategies. Requirements and Technology Advisory · Partner with business and technology stakeholders to translate complex business requirements into functional, non-functional, architectural, and technical requirements. · Advise stakeholders and senior technology leaders on solution alternatives, architectural trade-offs, technology risks, modernization opportunities, and long-term technology direction. · Facilitate technical decision-making across cross-functional teams and build alignment around architecture, integration, security, and implementation strategies. · Anticipate technology trends and assess their potential applicability and business impact. · Ensure designs balance immediate delivery objectives with long-term scalability, supportability, maintainability, and enterprise technology strategy. Application Engineering · Provide hands-on technical leadership across Java/J2EE, Spring Boot, Spring Security, Spring Data/JPA, Spring WebFlux, Spring Modulith, React/Angular, REST, GraphQL, and gRPC-based applications. · Lead development of distributed, highly available applications operating in multithreaded and complex enterprise environments. · Guide engineering teams in applying appropriate design patterns, modularization, API design, domain separation, performance optimization, caching, and resilience patterns. · Perform and guide complex application design, development, code review, integration, debugging, testing, and implementation activities. · Maintain high standards of software quality through architecture governance, engineering practices, automated quality controls, and effective code review. System and Technology Integration · Design complex integration strategies and interfaces connecting enterprise applications, databases, cloud services, external platforms, and technology ecosystems. · Define appropriate integration approaches using REST APIs, GraphQL, gRPC, Kafka, Amazon SQS, event-driven patterns, and publish/subscribe architectures. · Establish and improve system integration standards, practices, and reusable patterns. · Guide teams through complex system integration, application migration, interoperability, and platform modernization challenges. · Identify integration dependencies and risks early and establish solutions that minimize operational and architectural complexity. Cloud, Infrastructure, and DevSecOps · Architect cloud-based solutions using AWS services, including ECS Fargate, RDS, ALB, Lambda, S3, ElastiCache, EventBridge, SQS, SNS, API Gateway, CloudWatch, and infrastructure-as-code technologies such as CloudFormation. · Guide application containerization and orchestration using Docker and Kubernetes-based platforms. · Define and implement effective CI/CD and source-code management strategies using Azure DevOps, GitHub, GitHub Actions, GitLab, Azure Repos, Git, and JFrog Artifactory. · Integrate architecture, application development, infrastructure, testing, observability, and security practices into automated delivery pipelines. · Establish observability standards using Grafana, Prometheus, and CloudWatch to improve application reliability and operational visibility. Security and Risk Management · Embed security throughout architecture, development, testing, and deployment using shift-left security and DevSecOps principles. · Ensure application architectures comply with enterprise cybersecurity requirements, secure-development practices, and applicable cloud-security standards. · Lead technical remediation of application and infrastructure vulnerabilities and drive automation of security controls wherever practical. · Partner with corporate security teams on application and infrastructure security compliance, risk acceptance, configuration baselines, and remediation. · Guide teams in applying Spring Security, SonarQube, CodeQL, Rapid7, Fortify, Artifactory/XRay, SSL/TLS, authentication, authorization, and API security practices. Quality Engineering and Testing · Define and promote comprehensive testing strategies spanning unit, integration, system, performance, security, regression, and customer acceptance testing. · Champion automation to improve software quality, testing throughput, defect prevention, and overall test coverage. · Guide teams in the appropriate use of testing frameworks and tools such as JUnit, Mockito, Bruno, and automated CI/CD quality gates. · Lead investigation and resolution of significant defects and systemic quality issues. · Partner with business stakeholders during pilot and acceptance testing to ensure solutions meet intended business outcomes. Problem Solving and Technical Troubleshooting · Lead resolution of complex, high-impact technical issues spanning applications, infrastructure, integration, databases, networks, cloud environments, and third-party technologies. · Organize engineers, architects, infrastructure teams, vendors, and business stakeholders to resolve cross-functional technology problems. · Apply structured problem-solving and root-cause analysis techniques to prevent recurrence of significant production incidents. · Evaluate the business impact, technical risk, urgency, and long-term implications of technology issues when determining resolution strategies. · Provide advanced technical guidance for unusual, performance-related, or multiplatform problems. · Support critical production issues when required, including appropriate off-shift or weekend support for business-critical applications. AI-Assisted Engineering and Innovation · Drive responsible adoption of AI and Generative AI-assisted engineering across architecture, software development, testing, troubleshooting, documentation, and engineering automation. · Apply tools such as Microsoft Copilot and other approved AI engineering capabilities to improve developer productivity and software quality. · Identify opportunities to use AI and automation to accelerate engineering activities while maintaining enterprise security, quality, and governance expectations. · Coach engineering teams on effective and responsible use of emerging AI-assisted development practices. Technical Leadership and Capability Building · Mentor architects, technical leads, and software engineers in architecture, design, engineering standards, troubleshooting, and modern technology practices. · Identify engineering capability gaps and develop reusable approaches, standards, patterns, and practices that improve effectiveness across teams. · Foster a culture of technical excellence, innovation, engineering discipline, continuous learning, and continuous improvement. · Influence technical direction without direct people-management authority and build alignment across distributed and cross-functional teams. Required Qualifications · 14+ years of progressive experience in enterprise application development, architecture, integration, and technology solution delivery. · Extensive experience architecting and delivering large-scale, distributed, highly available enterprise applications. · Advanced expertise in Core Java, Java/J2EE, Spring Boot, Spring Security, Hibernate/Spring Data JPA, with experience in Spring WebFlux and Spring Modulith. · Strong experience with JavaScript, HTML, CSS, React and/or Angular. · Demonstrated experience producing high-level and detailed solution designs based on functional and non-functional business requirements. · Strong understanding of microservices, modular architectures, distributed systems, event-driven architecture, REST APIs, GraphQL, and gRPC. · Experience with Kafka, SQS, and publish/subscribe architectures. · Strong experience architecting for performance, scalability, resilience, high availability, reliability, security, and fault tolerance. · Experience with Docker and Kubernetes-based environments. · Strong knowledge of cloud architecture and services, preferably Amazon Web Services. · Experience with relational databases such as PostgreSQL and DB2. · Strong understanding of source-control and branching strategies using Git, GitHub, GitLab, and/or Azure Repos. · Experience designing and implementing CI/CD pipelines using Azure DevOps and GitHub Actions. · Experience with software quality and automated testing using JUnit and Mockito. · Strong knowledge of application security, vulnerability remediation, DevSecOps, and secure software development practices. · Working knowledge of load balancing, DNS, HTTP/HTTPS, and SSL/TLS. · Demonstrated ability to diagnose and resolve complex cross-technology application and infrastructure issues. · Ability to communicate complex technology concepts, architecture decisions