Core Network Lead, Run Team

Help Us Build The Future of Travel

At Airalo, we're making it easier for people to stay connected wherever they travel. As the world's first eSIM store, we help millions of travelers access affordable mobile data in 200+ countries and regions around the world.

Today, we're a team of 400+ people across 60+ countries, building a product used by travelers every day. We've grown quickly, but we've worked hard to keep what matters: trust, ownership, and the freedom for people to do great work without unnecessary layers or bureaucracy.

We're fully remote by design, genuinely global, and united by a shared mission to make travel simpler for everyone.

Your Next Destination

• Location: Remote.
• Contract: Full-time, permanent.
• Benefits: Learn more about our benefits here in this link - https://airalo-public.notion.site/Benefits-25396a97ffca81fb9bc1f0be479f1be3?pvs=74 
• Languages: English is our main working language day to day, so you'll need to be comfortable communicating in it both in meetings and async.

What You'll Do:

Lead, mentor and manage a team of seven engineers, QA specialists and Site Reliability Engineers responsible for operating the Mobile Core Network across its full lifecycle, from design, build and deployment through steady-state operations, change management, incident response and upgrades.
Manage the team’s work and people, covering sprint and capacity planning, prioritisation and stakeholder communication, alongside regular 1-to-1 meetings, fair and evidence-based performance reviews, and support for career growth.
Establish engineering best practices, automated testing strategy and technical handover standards.
Operate and manage the mobile core, built on a mix of CNFs and VNFs, from the subscriber database (HSS/HLR) through packet core, signalling (Diameter, SS7, DNS, GTP), voice and messaging platforms, ensuring end-to-end service readiness across data, voice and SMS, and working with NEPs, IPX/GRX partners, IaaS partners and Managed Service and SaaS providers.
Own the performance of the Mobile Core Network to meet 99.98% service uptime per year, defining and reporting on health KPIs (availability, attach and session success rates, call and SMS success rates, latency, packet loss and utilisation), supported by observability, monitoring and proactive alerting, and by preventative measures such as geo-redundant design, capacity forecasting, failover testing, post-incident reviews and problem management.
Own configuration management of the Core Network as a critical Day 2 discipline, including version-controlled configuration, change control, automated deployment and rollback, and configuration drift detection across all CNFs, VNFs and environments.
Work with the Build Team to take new systems into live operation, whether CNF, VNF, Managed Service or partner SaaS, by defining operational readiness and handover criteria, accepting systems into the Run Team once they meet them, and ensuring the team is trained, documented and equipped to operate them with minimal risk to service.

Requirements

• 5+ years hands-on in mobile core networks 
• 2+ years leading a team of engineers and/or QA specialists in an agile or delivery-focused environment.
• Strong working knowledge of both packet core and voice core, including the subscriber database (HSS/HLR), policy and charging, VoLTE and legacy circuit-switched voice.
• Expertise across the signalling stack, including Diameter, SS7 and SIP.
• Experience with messaging architecture and SMS routing, including interworking with other operators.
• Strong delivery mindset across multiple concurrent rollout streams, with clear communication and the ability to produce documentation good enough to hand a system over on.

Nice to have

• Automation experience: CI/CD pipelines, infrastructure as code (Terraform, Ansible), containerisation (Docker, Kubernetes) or automated signalling test frameworks.
• Hands-on with core MVNO vendors such as Nokia, Ericsson, Mavenir, Oracle Communications, Cisco, Summa Networks, NetNumber or XIUS.
• Cloud-native or virtualised network functions on AWS, Azure, GCP or private cloud.
• Degree in telecommunications engineering, computer science, electrical engineering or similar.

Why People Join Us

We started Airalo to make staying connected effortless, wherever you are in the world. Today, millions of travelers rely on our eSIMs, and many of the people building the product were customers first.

Our team spans 60+ countries, united by a shared belief that great work happens when people are trusted to own what they do. There's trust to own what you do, space to focus without constant layers of process, and a clear sense of what you're responsible for from day one.

As Airalo continues to grow, so do the opportunities to learn, take on new challenges, and make a real impact - from anywhere in the world.

Before You Hit Apply