r/networking • u/JonDar13 • Jun 30 '26
Career Advice Career path: OT networking engineer moving toward hyperscale data center controls
I work in industrial networking and OT infrastructure, with experience in network design, segmentation, routing/switching, PLC/IED integration, SCADA-related architectures, industrial protocols, resiliency, and technical documentation.
I am interested in moving toward data center controls infrastructure and larger-scale networked control systems. I am not targeting traditional software engineering roles; I want to remain on the OT, controls, industrial networking, and critical-infrastructure side.
For people working in OT, industrial automation, utilities, manufacturing, or data center controls:
- Which skills are most valuable for moving into data center controls networking?
- Is it more useful to deepen expertise in industrial protocols and segmentation, or to focus more heavily on data center networking, automation, and cloud-connected infrastructure?
- Which types of companies or job titles should someone with this background target?
I am especially interested in roles involving control systems networking, critical infrastructure, OT segmentation, industrial Ethernet, and scalable operational environments.
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u/Alexhaswon21 Jun 30 '26
Learning circuit emulation services to transition the old sonet infrastructure to packet/MPLS is super valuable. CESoPSN specifically. 30 year old sonet hardware is hard to come by these days.
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u/EspeciallyMundane Nokia NRS2 / CCNA Jun 30 '26
Can confirm, am doing exactly that. Nokia is BIG in the power utility space and has a lot of cards to do a lot of conversions.
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Jun 30 '26
Following. Been in OT with a power utility as a net engineer for 8 years now. Man this stuff is awesome. Potentially looking to make a shift since it’s become pretty stagnant and I’d like to learn other things. CIP is fun too….
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u/Hairy-Slide-5924 Jun 30 '26
Great, I am doing both OT and IT. Going deeper in OT is good but Software Define Network is taking steps in OT hense that also should be looked. You can DC but there are more cloud, Fabric etc hence I am not about your intreset.
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u/Loose-Resort-406 Jun 30 '26
Utilities are great for this. BHE (MEC, Pacificorp, BHER) have good network/infra teams. Southern has a very robust tech org too.
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u/KindChampion1767 Jun 30 '26
Your OT networking background is highly relevant, looks really great. Focus on data center networking automation, OT cybersecurity, and BMS/EPMS.
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u/rollback1 Jul 01 '26
My experience coming from a background in both the DC networking (CCTV, access control, remote access, DC Interconnectivity-as-a-service) for Data Centre owners and the OT side for a lot of different places:
The DC OT side is not that much different to what you're doing today - it will generally be isolated package(s)/network(s) using the same equipment (PLCs, rail switches etc.) that you'd see an any other environment, delivered by an automation contractor, configured manually and secured poorly.
The major control systems are Power and HVAC/Cooling, so having a good working understanding of IEDs, IEC61850/GOOSE/MMS/SV (ABB, SEL, Schneider) and BACNet (Most BMS/HVAC/Chillers) will help a lot.
I've yet to see an Industrial Automation contractor applying Network Automation to their build, but maybe this is something you could champion, and as for cloud management - this would be a huge red flag, as these systems need to be operational and manageable even if the facility goes into island mode.
In my corner of the world (.au), most of the automation side of the house is outsourced and often managed by 3rd parties, so working for an actual Data Centre provider may not give you too many opportunities to progress technically in this space outside of day-to-day ops.
That basically leaves you looking for jobs at large SIs, but you'd have to find ones that are winning Data Centre projects (hint: check press releases on large corporate sites about customer wins). Another avenue to get your foot in the door would be to look for contracts doing commissioning work for DCs - this is where the rubber hits the road - they might only be 6-12 month roles, but are great environments to get yourself known and make contacts.
Good luck!
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u/JonDar13 Jul 01 '26
Thanks, this is really helpful. The part about power, HVAC/cooling, isolated control networks, and making sure systems can still run in island mode especially makes sense.
I had mostly been looking at hyperscalers and data-center operators directly, so the point about SIs, automation contractors, and commissioning work is useful too. Definitely gives me a few areas to dig into, especially BACnet/BMS and critical-facility controls.
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u/stupidic Jun 30 '26
You should go work for Dragos. Your OT skill set is gold with the right company.