PHILIP JONES

Technical Lead | Platform Engineering    Applied AI | DevEx

Profile

Technical Leader with over 20 years of hands-on experience bridging deep Linux system administration, cloud-native architectures, and intelligent automation. Today, a core pillar of my strategy is Applied AI—integrating Large Language Models (LLMs) directly into the developer lifecycle to automate complex tasks and build full-stack internal tooling. My mission is to architect robust Internal Developer Platforms (IDPs) that accelerate Developer Experience (DevEx) and empower engineering teams to ship code faster and safer.

Work Experience

bet365
Mar 2023 - Present
Release Platform Technical Lead
  • Applied AI & DevEx: Architecting AI-augmented developer workflows; integrating LLMs into internal tooling to automate complex tasks and dramatically reduce developer friction.
  • Platform Engineering: Owning the technical roadmap and architecture for the Internal Developer Platform (IDP), including GitLab, Jenkins, Ansible, GCP, and SourceGraph.
  • Full-Stack Development: Designing scalable internal systems (Python, Flask, FastAPI, PostgreSQL) hosted on Google Cloud Platform (GCP) empowering hundreds of engineers.
  • Leadership: Coaching Platform and DevOps Engineers, fostering cloud-native practices and AI adoption.
bet365
Apr 2021 - Mar 2023
Senior DevOps Platform Engineer
  • Developed and maintained enterprise CI/CD pipelines using Jenkins, Ansible, and GitLab CI/CD.
  • Automated administration and operational tasks using Python, Bash, Groovy, and PowerShell.
  • Owned and administered critical DevOps tooling (SourceGraph, GitLab) as third-line support.
  • Designed custom automation tools, reporting dashboards, and internal REST APIs.
bet365
Dec 2018 - Mar 2021
Environment Engineer
  • Managed and maintained UAT, pre-production, and test environments for core applications.
  • Developed automation scripts to streamline repetitive tasks, applying 20+ years of Unix/Linux expertise to introduce new system administration standards.
  • Overhauled the on-premise GitLab instance, improving stability and streamlining backups.
Quadriga Worldwide LTD
Oct 2003 - Nov 2018
Technical Support Engineer (Global 3rd/4th Line)
  • Provided global platform and application support across a 1000+ Linux-based server estate.
  • Automated complex build and backup processes utilising Bash, Puppet, and Saltstack.
  • Pioneered containerisation of legacy systems using Docker, Libvirt, and QEMU/KVM.

Early Career History

  • Senior Product / Field Support Engineer
    Quadriga Worldwide LTD     Feb 2001 - Oct 2003
  • In-store Technical Engineer
    Currys Electrical Retail     Dec 1998 - Jan 2001
  • Earlier Electronic, Video & Bench Engineering Roles
    H Lehmann LTD, Thorn UK & Rumbelows     Jul 1989 - Dec 1998