Cloud Systems Analyst, FinOps

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If you don’t think you meet all of the criteria below but are still interested in the job, please apply. Nobody checks every box - we’re looking for candidates that are particularly strong in a few areas, and have some interest and capabilities in others.

About the Role:

The Cloud Systems Analyst, FinOps is a hands-on technical and financial role responsible for building Kong’s FinOps discipline from the ground up. This person will own cloud cost visibility, reporting, and optimization across our three cloud providers — AWS, GCP, and Azure — and will play a key role in supporting internal use cases on Kong’s own Konnect platform. The role sits at the intersection of cloud engineering, data analysis, and AI-assisted automation, with a mandate to make cloud spending transparent, accountable, and proactively managed.

Key Responsibilities

1. Build and Implement a FinOps Practice at Kong

1. Define the FinOps operating model from scratch — governance framework, cost allocation structures, and tagging standards across AWS, GCP, and Azure.

2. Partner with Engineering and Finance to establish cloud budgets, chargeback processes, and commitment discount strategies (RIs, Savings Plans, CUDs).

3. Use AI tooling — including Kong Konnect’s AI Gateway — to surface billing anomalies and generate recommendations from cloud usage data.

4. Embed cost-awareness into engineering workflows and serve as the internal go-to for cloud financial accountability.

2. Build Cost & Usage Reporting and Dashboards

1. Deliver a unified reporting layer across AWS Cost Explorer, GCP Billing, and Azure Cost Management — normalized for cross-provider comparison.

2. Build dashboards showing real-time spend, usage trends, idle resources, and budget variance by team and environment.

3. Produce monthly OPEX variance reports and executive summaries for Finance and department leadership.

4. Integrate AI-assisted analytics to auto-detect anomalies, forecast month-end spend, and flag optimization opportunities.

5. Expose cost and usage data as internal APIs via Kong Konnect, enabling self-service access for Engineering and Finance.

3. Automate Cost Optimizations

1. Turn reporting findings into automated remediation — auto-shutdown of idle instances, right-sizing, and orphaned resource cleanup across all three clouds.

2. Write and maintain automation scripts and pipelines (Python, Terraform, cloud-native tooling) that continuously resolve cost inefficiencies.

3. Implement event-driven automation (AWS Lambda, GCP Cloud Functions, Azure Automation) to respond to budget alerts and anomaly triggers.

4. Use AI/LLM tooling to accelerate script generation and policy-as-code development, reducing manual overhead.

5. Track outcomes via measurable KPIs — spend reduced, resources reclaimed, automation coverage — and report to IT leadership regularly.

4. Kong Konnect Internal Platform Support

1. Dogfood Kong’s own Konnect platform for internal use cases — API routes for cost data, automation triggers, and reporting endpoints.

2. Leverage Konnect’s AI Gateway to route and govern LLM-based requests powering FinOps workflows.

3. Provide real-world product feedback to Kong’s engineering and product teams based on internal usage.

What is Needed

• Experience: 3–5 years in a cloud infrastructure, cloud financial management, or FinOps-focused role. Direct, hands-on experience managing cloud costs and usage across AWS, GCP, and/or Azure is required. Experience building or formalizing a FinOps practice is strongly preferred.

• Cloud Provider Depth: Working proficiency across AWS (Cost Explorer, Trusted Advisor, AWS Budgets, Lambda, IAM), GCP (Cloud Billing, BigQuery, Cloud Functions, GKE cost visibility), and Azure (Cost Management + Billing, Azure Advisor, Azure Automation). Breadth across all three providers is preferred over depth in one.

• FinOps Expertise: Demonstrated ability to build cost allocation frameworks, enforce tagging policies, model commitment discount strategies, and deliver OPEX variance reporting. FinOps Certified Practitioner (FinOps Foundation) is a plus.

• Automation & Scripting: Hands-on experience writing automation scripts in Python or similar languages. Familiarity with infrastructure-as-code (Terraform, CloudFormation, or equivalent) and event-driven cloud automation patterns is expected.

• AI Tooling Proficiency: Practical experience using AI and LLM-based tools (e.g., Claude, Copilot, or similar) to accelerate analysis, generate scripts, and automate workflows. Comfort working with AI-assisted coding environments and prompt-driven data analysis is strongly preferred. Experience with API gateways or AI gateway platforms (such as Kong Konnect) is a plus.

• Data & Reporting Skills: Ability to build and maintain dashboards and reports using tools such as Looker, Grafana, Google Looker Studio, Power BI, or cloud-native BI tools. Comfort querying billing data directly via BigQuery, Athena, or Azure Data Explorer.

• Kong Konnect: Familiarity with API management platforms — particularly Kong Gateway or Kong Konnect — is a plus. Willingness to learn and actively work with Konnect as an internal platform practitioner is expected.

• Collaboration & Communication: Proven ability to translate complex cloud financial data into clear, actionable insights for non-technical stakeholders in Finance and leadership. Comfortable working cross-functionally across Engineering, IT, and Finance.

• This is a hybrid role, requiring three days per week in the office.

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About Kong:

Kong Inc., a leading developer of API and AI connectivity technologies, is building the infrastructure that powers the agentic era. Trusted by the Fortune 500 and startups alike, Kong's unified API and AI platform, Kong Konnect, enables organizations to secure, manage, accelerate, govern, and monetize the flow of intelligence across APIs and AI models. For more information, visit www.konghq.com.