Platform
Engineering

Michael James Ashmore-Drummond

DevOps and Platform
Engineering Contractor

United Kingdom

Available for remote-first contract engagements, with flexibility for some hybrid working.

Hands-on AWS Platform Engineer with 12+ years of infrastructure experience across financial services and UK public-sector engagements. Specialises in AWS, EKS, cloud migrations, CI/CD, automation engineering and infrastructure as code. Combines project delivery and operational support with technical leadership, mentoring and knowledge transfer.

Get in touch
Core expertise
  • AWS
  • EKS
  • Terraform
  • GitLab CI
  • Helm

01 / Expertise

Technical Expertise

Platform & Delivery
AWS, EC2, Terraform, Terragrunt, Packer, Kubernetes, EKS, ECS, Docker, Docker Swarm, ECR, GitLab CI, Helm
Networking & Security
VPC, VPC endpoints, Transit Gateway, ELB/ALB, Route 53, IAM, IAM Identity Center, Secrets Manager, Cognito, API Gateway
Operations
CloudWatch, CloudTrail, Prometheus, Grafana, New Relic, Sysdig
Data & Integration
S3, RDS, DynamoDB, DMS, Redshift (infrastructure), Lake Formation (infrastructure), Athena, Lambda, API Gateway, SQS, SNS, Kinesis
Programming & Scripting
Python, Bash
Collaboration & Development Tools
Jira, Confluence, Figma, GitLab, GitHub, Bitbucket, Bamboo, Microsoft Teams, Slack
AI Tools
Codex, Claude Code, Cursor, Amazon Bedrock, LibreChat deployment

02 / Delivery

Selected Delivery Highlights

Admiral Money

AWS Replatforming

Led a complete replatforming into a new AWS organisation, working hands-on alongside the engineering team to establish new accounts and environments. Migrated services from ECS to EKS and delivered a platform supporting over 50 microservices, enabling more frequent, reliable deployments and expansion into new business areas.

Admiral Money

CI/CD and service provisioning

Implemented configurable GitLab CI/CD pipelines using GitLab Runners and Helm deployments across multiple services. Designed infrastructure as code (IaC) using Terraform modules and Terragrunt, enabling developers to provision their own service-specific resources through HCL input files.

Admiral Money

AWS data platform and analytics integration

Built and supported AWS infrastructure to bring data from AWS accounts hosting application environments into a central data platform for large-scale analytics. The work covered storage, database and analytics infrastructure, including DMS, Redshift, Lake Formation, Glue, Athena, SageMaker, Lambda and API Gateway, together with the supporting access patterns.

Admiral Money

Cloud cost optimisation

Delivered annualised AWS savings of over £20,000 by removing unused resources, right-sizing compute resources, and optimising autoscaling, service hosting, storage and backup management.

Capgemini - UK public sector

Application infrastructure rebuild in AWS

Rebuilt a privately hosted application's infrastructure in AWS, working from existing documentation and collaborating with the architect. Delivered the web/application tier, database, networking, monitoring and access configuration, creating a more manageable AWS estate and allowing the private hosting environment to be decommissioned.

Capgemini - UK public sector

Kubernetes platform for log ingestion and processing

Built the EKS cluster for large-scale log ingestion and processing, with CI/CD pipelines and Helm deployments. Implemented platform monitoring using Prometheus and Grafana, and mentored the client DevOps team.

Capgemini - UK public sector

Infrastructure recoverability and managed services

Introduced infrastructure as code to improve recoverability. Migrated Elasticsearch and Redis to managed AWS services to reduce costs and operational overhead.

Capgemini - UK public sector

EC2 image building and deployment

Built machine images with Packer and delivered EC2 deployment workflows using Terraform and CI/CD.

03 / Experience

Experience

Admiral Money

2022 - 2026

Lead DevOps/Platform Engineer

Technical Lead and People Manager for the Platform and DevOps function, combining hands-on AWS engineering with team leadership and coordination across multiple development teams. Scope covered application hosting, build and deployment infrastructure, data processing and analytics integration, alongside the ongoing operation and improvement of the platform.

  • Led and contributed hands-on to the design and implementation of new AWS accounts, environments and platform foundations as part of a complete replatforming into a new AWS organisation. Worked alongside the other engineers while leading the team and coordinating delivery across the different areas of platform work.
  • Migrated services from ECS to EKS and helped establish a platform supporting over 50 microservices. The new environments and deployment infrastructure enabled more frequent, reliable releases, simplified service management and provided room for scaling and the introduction of new business areas within the same environments.
  • Implemented configurable GitLab CI/CD pipelines using GitLab Runners, with Helm deployments across a range of services. Used environment-specific configuration to accommodate different project requirements and support a consistent approach to building and deploying applications into EKS.
  • Designed and maintained infrastructure as code (IaC) using Terraform modules and Terragrunt across multiple environments, covering networking, identity, application delivery, monitoring and backups. Made service resource provisioning configurable through developer-maintained HCL inputs, simplifying infrastructure management and making the platform easier to extend as requirements changed.
  • Built and supported infrastructure for new data processing capabilities and integration with the wider analytics estate. The AWS data platform spanned S3, RDS, DynamoDB, DMS, Redshift, Lake Formation, Athena, SageMaker, Glue, Lambda and API Gateway, together with their supporting access patterns.
  • Operated and continuously improved the AWS platform through incident response, documentation, monitoring and cloud cost optimisation. Combined project delivery with operational support for applications and infrastructure running on the platform.
  • Led and coached Platform and DevOps Engineers while remaining involved in design and implementation. Managed work intake, hiring and interviewing, and supported the team's development alongside the technical delivery expected of the function.
  • Coordinated platform work across teams and contributed to technical design reviews and engineering workflow improvements. Worked with architects, engineers, testers and product owners on technical decisions, planning and coordination for infrastructure changes and service delivery.

Admiral Money

2021 - 2022

DevOps/Platform Engineer

  • Developed and maintained Terraform infrastructure, GitLab CI pipelines and Helm deployment processes for Kubernetes workloads.
  • Supported AWS platform services across networking, identity, observability and application delivery.

Capgemini - UK public sector clients

2016 - 2020

Platform Engineer

Delivered cloud platform and migration work across multiple public-sector client engagements, combining infrastructure as code, containerisation and operations in secure enterprise environments.

Live Service Platform Migration

Rebuilt and delivered a privately hosted application's infrastructure in AWS, using existing documentation and working with the architect. Covered the web/application tier, database, networking, monitoring and access configuration.

Protective Monitoring Platform

Built the EKS cluster for large-scale log ingestion and processing, with CI/CD pipelines and Helm deployments. Implemented Prometheus and Grafana monitoring and mentored the client DevOps team.

Infrastructure Improvement & Cost Optimisation

Introduced infrastructure as code to improve recoverability, and migrated Elasticsearch and Redis to managed AWS services to reduce costs and operational overhead.

EC2 Image Build and Deployment

Built machine images with Packer and delivered EC2 deployment workflows using Terraform and CI/CD.

Containerisation Platform

Delivered secure, scalable AWS infrastructure for containerised applications across Linux and Windows nodes, covering Docker Swarm, networking, AMI builds, logging and monitoring.

Capgemini

2014 - 2016

Deployment Engineer

Supported Red Hat, Solaris and WebLogic environments. Coordinated application and infrastructure deployments into development and production, including support during key business events.

04 / Qualifications

Certifications & Education

Previously held certifications

AWS Certified Solutions Architect - Associate
Certified Kubernetes Administrator (CKA)

Education

BSc Digital & Technology Solutions (Software Engineering)
Aston University, 2020

05 / Contact

Get in touch

Available for remote-first contract engagements, with flexibility for some hybrid working.