SaaS datacenter migration, as SQL SME
Served as subject-matter expert and lead engineer from the SQL team on the datacenter migration for Expesite, supporting production systems across both public and private cloud throughout the transition.
Cloud & Infrastructure Architecture
Ziyad Uqdah
Senior Systems Engineer — Azure and hybrid cloud architecture, enterprise migration, data platforms, and disaster recovery.
Nineteen-plus years across systems administration, infrastructure engineering, and cloud architecture. I work on the parts of a migration that carry real risk: estate discovery, wave planning, cutover, and recovery that has been tested rather than assumed. Datacenter transitions for production SaaS, SQL Server platform modernization, and DR runbooks written against contractual SLA, RTO, and RPO targets.
New Orleans, LA
Open to remote & hybrid
19+ years in the field
B.S. Information Technology
19+Years across systems, infrastructure, and cloud engineering
6,000Mailboxes, 300 domains, and 150 websites at peak hosting scale
SMEOn the SQL team for a production SaaS datacenter migration
2×Peer-nominated engineering awards across two organizations
What I build
Four areas where the work is hardest to fake
Migrations rarely fail on the technology. They fail on the dependency nobody mapped, the runbook nobody tested, and the cutover window that turned out to be four hours shorter than it needed to be. These are the areas I have spent a career in.
01
Cloud & hybrid architecture
Azure landing zones, hybrid connectivity, and identity integration designed so the foundation is reproducible rather than a set of portal clicks nobody can repeat.
02
Datacenter & workload migration
Moving real estates, not lab samples. Dependency mapping, wave planning, rehost-versus-replatform calls, a pilot wave before the fleet, and a rollback path worth using.
03
Data platform modernization
SQL Server version upgrades and platform transitions, with performance baselines captured before and after, plus warehouse and analytics work across modern platforms.
04
Resilience & disaster recovery
DR designed against the SLA, RTO, and RPO actually committed to in customer contracts — with runbooks written so someone other than the author can execute them.
Selected impact
Work with a deadline and consequences attached
A shortlist of engagements where the outcome was measurable and the failure mode was public.
A DR runbook written against real numbers
Authored the disaster recovery runbook and method of procedure for Expesite, built against the product's actual SLA, RTO, and RPO commitments rather than aspirational targets — then maintained the plan and ran regular tests against it.
SQL Server 2016 → 2019 platform upgrade
Led the version upgrade for SaaS application Lucernex, alongside building and maintaining multi-layered redundant production environments sized to meet committed SLAs.
Azure hybrid cloud across a regulated enterprise
Designed, integrated, and implemented a Microsoft Azure hybrid cloud solution enterprise-wide at a bank — running alongside core banking platforms from FIS, Fiserv, Finastra, Banker's Toolbox, and Ellie Mae.
Space Launch System program infrastructure
Supported Boeing's SLS program at NASA MAF: VPN and network connectivity, certificate, token, and smart card access, and a fleet-wide replacement of VMware ESX 6.0 hosts with 6.5 across the datacenter.
Full virtualization of a hosting estate
Ran hosting infrastructure at a peak of roughly 300 domains, 150 websites, and 6,000 mailboxes — and virtualized every last physical server on the network.
Professional experience
Nineteen years, told in order
From Tier 2 network support to senior escalation engineering for Microsoft Premier customers — with datacenter, banking, aerospace, and SaaS environments in between.
Senior Microsoft Systems Engineer, Premier Support — US Cloud
Dec 2023 — PresentSt. Louis, MO · Remote
- Serve as a primary escalation point for expert-level Microsoft technology tickets, resolving advanced issues across cloud and on-premises environments.
- Mentor and cross-train Associate and Premier Support Engineers through shadowing, knowledge-sharing, and structured onboarding, building a team resilient to absence in critical processes.
- Author and maintain Knowledge Base articles that reduce resolution time for recurring escalations across the support team.
- Lead process adherence and service delivery best practices for the team's support pod, monitoring performance metrics to sustain high client satisfaction.
- Review and interview candidates for the Data Platforms & Analytics and BST teams, and author the technical interview questions used across the hiring process.
- Support QA process improvements for automated ticket escalation workflows.
Microsoft Systems Engineer, Premier Support — US Cloud
Dec 2021 — Dec 2023St. Louis, MO · Remote
- Delivered client-facing technical guidance across Microsoft cloud and on-premises solutions, supporting cloud-first deployment strategies.
- Supported clients through new deployments and migrations, resolving technical issues that could affect go-live timelines.
- Reduced ticket onboarding and resolution time through high-quality case data and proactive account management.
- Named Engineer of the Month, December 2022 — peer-nominated, one recipient monthly; promoted to Senior Systems Engineer, December 2023.
Systems Engineer, Cloud Operations — Accruent
Dec 2018 — Dec 2021New Orleans, LA · Hybrid
- Served as SME and lead engineer from the SQL team on the datacenter migration for SaaS application Expesite, supporting production systems across public and private cloud.
- Authored the disaster recovery runbook and method of procedure for Expesite based on product SLAs, RTO, and RPO targets, and performed regular tests against it.
- Led the SQL Server 2016 to 2019 upgrade for SaaS application Lucernex.
- Built and maintained redundant production environments to meet committed SLAs, using configuration management tooling to build and scale application environments.
- Developed automation scripts to reduce manual configuration work, and planned capacity expansion across the customer-facing estate.
- Won the Accruent CloudOps C.H.A.M.P.I.O.N. award, Q1 2020 — peer-nominated, one recipient per quarter.
System Administrator II — Fidelity Bank LA
Dec 2017 — Dec 2018Greater New Orleans Area
- Designed, integrated, and implemented a Microsoft Azure hybrid cloud solution across the Fidelity enterprise.
- Deployed ConnectWise Manage and ConnectWise Automate enterprise-wide.
- Managed Hyper-V, VMware, and Azure infrastructure, storage networks, physical servers, and multiple colocation spaces.
- Maintained backup and replication infrastructure across Veeam, Doubletake, and TierPoint/LiveVault cloud backup, including disaster recovery planning against multiple replication targets.
- Administered core banking and financial services applications — FIS, Fiserv, Finastra, Banker's Toolbox, and Ellie Mae — alongside Microsoft 365, Active Directory, Azure AD, SQL Server, SolarWinds NPM, IBM MaaS360, and KACE.
IT Specialist IV — All Points Logistics (Boeing contract)
Aug 2017 — May 2018New Orleans, LA
Concurrent contract engagement alongside the Fidelity Bank role above.
- Supported Boeing's Space Launch System (SLS) program at NASA's Michoud Assembly Facility, troubleshooting NASA and Boeing VPN and network connectivity and managing certificate, token, and smart card access for Boeing employees.
- Migrated NASA switch ports to Boeing VLANs and moved workstation block points to Boeing's network standard.
- Replaced VMware ESX 6.0 hosts with ESX 6.5 across the Boeing MAF datacenter.
- Configured and supported video teleconferencing hardware and sessions, imaged and hardened Boeing laptops, and handled offsite backup tape rotation for the MAF datacenter.
Senior Network Administrator — Merchants Foodservice
Sep 2016 — Aug 2017Hattiesburg, MS
- Managed cloud and physical VMware infrastructure, storage networks, and Windows servers supporting the full company enterprise.
- Maintained network infrastructure across switches, routers, firewalls, VoIP, web content filtering, multiple internet circuits, MPLS WAN links, and datacenter colocation space.
- Administered Citrix XenApp, Honeywell VoCollect, Exchange, SQL Server, and Active Directory.
- Installed and configured CentOS 7 servers and open-source tooling, including Nagios Core, MediaWiki, and WordPress.
- Decommissioned legacy systems — ManageEngine OpsManager, SharePoint, and GS1 Imaging — as part of infrastructure consolidation.
System Administrator I — C Spire
Oct 2014 — Sep 2016Hattiesburg, MS
- Migrated MegaGate systems — file shares, backups, workstations, applications, and servers — into the C Spire enterprise following acquisition, and decommissioned the legacy systems left behind.
- Managed multi-site VMware vCenter and ESX infrastructure, and administered Exchange, Active Directory, Nagios Core, KACE, and Edgewave iPrism.
- Maintained MegaGate datacenter facility operations, including vendor maintenance scheduling, generator load testing, cabling, and colocation customer support.
Systems Administrator — MegaGate Broadband
Aug 2012 — Oct 2014Hattiesburg, MS
- Managed web and email hosting platforms at a peak scale of roughly 300 hosted domains, 150 websites, and 6,000 mailboxes across Plesk, Surgemail, and Edgewave spam filtering.
- Virtualized every last physical server on the network.
- Administered VMware infrastructure, storage, and Windows and Unix systems including MySQL, SQL Server, BIND, Apache, IIS, Nagios XI, MRTG, and Ubiquiti AirControl and UniFi.
- Managed corporate firewall VPN access over RADIUS, the server public network firewall, and the full backup estate — VM, file-level, and telecom equipment backups, offsite replication, and DR planning.
- Maintained datacenter facility systems including diesel and propane generators, environmental monitoring, and equipment racking and cabling.
Network Support Specialist — MegaGate Broadband
Aug 2010 — Aug 2012Hattiesburg, MS
- Delivered Tier 2 technical support for network engineering and systems administration teams across Metro Ethernet, T1, DSL, VoIP, and web and email hosting products.
- Managed ITaaS client services including turnkey server deployments, hardware and software support, and LAN, WAN, and internet troubleshooting.
- Promoted to Systems Administrator, August 2012.
IT Support Technician — Pine Belt Mental Healthcare Resources
Aug 2009 — Aug 2010Hattiesburg, MS
- Migrated all production systems and equipment to the corporate office datacenter.
- Maintained Exchange and Plesk email servers and Active Directory for agency operations.
Network Technician — Service Management Group
Jan 2007 — Jan 2009Hattiesburg, MS
- Managed server and network infrastructure, workstations, and datacenter colocation space.
- Automated manual server processes using VBScript and batch scripting.
- Contributed to a development team building a SQL-database-backed web application for archiving user-uploaded video content.
- Administered SQL Server and Active Directory, and made .NET and ASP code changes to homegrown company applications.
Labs & projects
Built in the lab, not just on the slide
Production experience is the record. These are the environments I stand up on my own time to keep the reference architectures current — and to have something to point at rather than describe.
Placeholder content. These four tracks are scaffolding while the lab environments are being built out. Each card will be replaced with the real build: architecture diagram, infrastructure-as-code repository, and a written summary of what was proven.
In build
Azure landing zone, defined as code
A reference enterprise-scale landing zone built entirely from infrastructure-as-code: management group hierarchy, subscription design, hub-and-spoke networking, policy and governance guardrails, and cost tagging that survives contact with a real subscription.
AzureBicep / TerraformAzure PolicyHub-spoke
In build
Hybrid identity: Active Directory to Entra ID
An on-premises forest synchronized to a tenant, exercising the scenarios that actually cause trouble: sync error remediation, conditional access design, privileged access review, and a tenant-to-tenant consolidation of the kind that follows an acquisition.
Active DirectoryEntra IDConditional AccessExchange
In build
Data platform modernization path
A SQL Server estate carried through the modernization route end to end — compatibility assessment, performance baselines captured before and after, migration to a managed platform, and ingestion into a warehouse and analytics layer on top.
SQL ServerAzure SQLSnowflakeDatabricksFabric
In build
Disaster recovery, actually failed over
Replication and backup architecture designed against a stated RTO and RPO, a recovery runbook written for someone other than its author, and a documented failover test that demonstrates the numbers hold. Most DR plans have never been run.
ReplicationBackup architectureRunbooksFailover testing
Technical depth
The stack behind the work
Cloud & virtualization
AzureAWSGCPVMwareHyper-VAkamai Cloud ManagerRackspace Cloud
Databases & data platforms
SQL ServerAzure SQLPostgreSQLMySQLSnowflakeDatabricks
Development & DevOps
CI/CDSDLCALMQAAgileScrum
BI, analytics & automation
Power BIPower PlatformMicrosoft Fabric
Email & collaboration
ExchangeMicrosoft 365Entra IDPleskSurgemail
Scripting
PowerShellBashBatch
Datacenter & disaster recovery
Backup & DR planningReplicationColocation managementCapacity planning
Identity, directory & OS
Active DirectoryEntra ID / Azure ADHybrid identityWindows ServerLinux
Education & honors
Credentials
Bachelor of Science, Information Technology
Franklin University · 2017
Associate of Arts and Sciences, Computer Information Systems & Technology
Jones County Junior College · 2007
President's List, Franklin University
CSEMS Scholarship Recipient
Francis T. Edwards Award for Scholastic Achievement
Engineer of the Month, US Cloud (Dec 2022)
Accruent CloudOps C.H.A.M.P.I.O.N., Q1 2020
Get in touch
Open to senior cloud and infrastructure architecture roles.
If you are planning a migration, modernizing a data platform, or trying to find out whether your disaster recovery plan would survive being run — that is the conversation I am good at. Reply time is within one business day, in writing.