Reporting to the Head of IT, the person will play a key role in the implementation, operation and continuous hands-on maintenance of the Institute’s on-premises Data Center (CPD). This is a practical infrastructure role in a greenfield environment, with direct responsibility for deploying, operating and improving the systems that will support biomedical research, scientific computing, research data management and institutional digital services.
The position has strong growth and visibility potential, as the Data Center is expected to become part of a broader federated infrastructure serving the biomedical data hub research cluster. The person will therefore contribute not only to the Institute’s internal capabilities, but also to future collaborations with other research institutes co-funded by the ”la Caixa” Foundation that may require access to shared computing, storage and data services.
This role is suited to someone who enjoys building reliable infrastructure from the ground up, working close to researchers and technology platforms, and helping shape the digital backbone of a new biomedical research institute.
Key responsibilities and duties:
Design, implement and operare the Institute’s on-premises Data Center, from technology selection to deployment and day-to-day operation.
Contribute hands-on to the configuration, deployment, troubleshooting and maintenance of the infrastructure supporting research platforms, scientific computing, data storage and institutional digital services.
Administer Linux-based systems in production environments, ensuring reliability, maintainability and appropriate documentation.
Implement and operate virtualization, container and/or orchestration environments relevant to scientific workloads, including platforms such as SLURM, Kubernetes or equivalent technologies.
Participate in the operation of CPU/GPU-based computing environments for biomedical research, including support for data analysis capacity.
Manage the full lifecycle of data storage infrastructure supporting research activities, scientific platforms, and institutional services, including planning, deployment, operation, optimization, capacity management, technology refresh, and decommissioning, while ensuring availability, performance, scalability, security, and long-term sustainability.
Implement backup, disaster recovery and resilience solutions adapted to critical research data, platform operations and institutional continuity needs.
Manage procurement processes related to data center infrastructure and services, including requirements definition, technical specifications, vendor evaluation, vendor selection, purchase order management and invoice validation.
Apply appropriate infrastructure security controls. Knowledge of NIS2 or equivalent cybersecurity frameworks will be considered an advantage.
Experience Required:
Bachelor’s degree in computer science, Information Technology, or a related field is a minimum requirement.
5–7 years of experience in roles such as: System Administrator, Infrastructure Engineer, or Data Center Operations.
Hands-on experience in on-premises environments in three or more core infrastructure areas, such as Linux systems administration, virtualization, storage, networking, HPC/scientific computing, disaster recovery or data center operations.
Experience in scientific environments will be an advantage
Technical skills:
Strong practical knowledge of Linux server environments, including configuration, troubleshooting, scripting, monitoring, patching and routine maintenance.
Familiarity with virtualization, containerization and/or orchestration technologies, such as Kubernetes or equivalent platforms.
Experience managing large-scale storage infrastructures, including block, file, and object storage, covering deployment, performance optimization, capacity planning, technology refresh, and service continuity.
Basic knowledge of networking concepts, including VLANs, firewalls, routing, DNS, network segmentation and secure remote access.
Strong understanding of large-scale compute environments, including resource allocation, workload scheduling, performance optimization, and the operation of CPU- and GPU-based infrastructure, with hands-on experience administering SLURM or comparable workload management and scheduling platforms.
Understanding of backup, disaster recovery, high availability and resilience principles.
Experience operating infrastructure in data-intensive data centers.
Infrastructure security controls, including access management, patching, hardening, segmentation, secure administration and encryption.
Ability to write and maintain clear technical documentation, operational procedures, infrastructure inventories and handover notes.
Ability to interact with vendors and service providers, review technical proposals, compare options and contribute to technical specifications.
Soft skills:
Strong problem solver with a high level of autonomy
Comfortable working directly with infrastructure, configuring systems, and troubleshooting incidents
High sense of ownership and responsibility
High level of English and Catalan or Spanish