Sr Lead M&A Architect

Cox Automotive - Infrastructure & Operations



Role

Senior Lead M&A Infrastructure Architect

Description

The Senior Lead M&A Infrastructure Architect leads complex, multi-threaded M&A infrastructure initiatives, evaluating and synthesizing target organizations' infrastructure across domains and defining integration strategies and architecture decisions for integration with Cox Automotive technology standards while preserving deal value. The role sets architectural direction for multiple concurrent acquisitions and divestitures, balances integration priorities with operational capacity, and supports acquired teams throughout the integration process.

As a senior technical leader, this position is accountable not only for technical outcomes but also for scaling M&A integration capabilities through standards, patterns, automation, and AI-enabled practices.

This position partners closely with the M&A Center of Excellence, the IOPS M&A Integration Lead, Infrastructure and Operations platform teams (Cloud, Network, Incident and Data Center), and executive leadership to define current, transition, and future state architectures, defining "the what and why", along with actionable roadmaps that delivery teams can execute. The role serves as a trusted advisor to executive stakeholders, informing deal strategy, integration options, and investment decisions across the M&A portfolio.

The role champions and scales AI-augmented methods to accelerate due diligence, improve assessment quality, and strengthen integration planning across the full M&A lifecycle including Due Diligence, Integration Planning, Day 1, Post-Merger Integration, and Steady State. As AI reshapes infrastructure management, the Senior Lead Architect drives adoption of AI-augmented architecture, analysis, and decision support to accelerate outcomes, reduce risk, and increase integration quality.

A key responsibility is balancing rapid integration requirements with operational stability, cost efficiency, and long-term enterprise strategy, while protecting the value of acquired teams and enabling successful transition into Cox Automotive operating models.

Key Responsibilities

• Own infrastructure architecture strategy for the M&A portfolio, authoring and governing infrastructure integration blueprints and roadmaps across current, transition, and future states for multiple concurrent acquisitions and divestitures.

• Develop multi-domain scenario plans with trade-off analysis across cost, risk, and delivery dimensions, mapping current to future state in coordination with the M&A Center of Excellence and corporate development.

• Produce architecture decisions and design artifacts that enable delivery teams to implement solutions that are scalable, secure, supportable, and aligned with enterprise strategy.

• Create design artifacts and diagrams representing desired changes in infrastructure architecture.

• Establish, evolve, and govern Cox Automotive infrastructure integration standards, design patterns, and reference architectures; document and guide variances through approval.

• Lead alignment with acquired company stakeholders and CAI Infrastructure and Operations platform teams to align on roadmap and sequencing; influence infrastructure, platform, security, network, database, and automation teams without direct authority.

• Serve as a technical authority bridging platform engineering and delivery teams, reviewing designs and improving collaboration between groups.

• Facilitate virtual and in-person working sessions, including whiteboarding, to build alignment on integration direction.

• Synthesize complex technical findings into executive-ready narratives highlighting decisions, risks, tradeoffs, and progress aligned to deal milestones; brief senior leadership on integration posture and architectural direction.

• Evaluate operational and engineering capacity impacts of incoming scope and provide readouts for downstream planning, including staffing, tooling, and run-cost implications.

• Use AI-assisted techniques for infrastructure due diligence, including document analysis, data room assessment, infrastructure scope classification, technology overlap…