One Thousand for Montanstahl SA Stabio, Ticino, Switzerland (Hybrid)
Lake Lugano on your doorstep, the Alps at your back, Milan under an hour away: welcome to an office most people only see on their summer holidays. We're looking for someone who'd rather build the plumbing than talk about it. For one of our clients.
At One Thousand, we create AI breakthroughs with our clients: fast, hands-on, without the hype. Here, we're recruiting for our breakthrough client Montanstahl SA, a leading manufacturer of customized steel profiles headquartered in Stabio (Ticino) and part of an international industrial group with operations across Switzerland, Germany, Italy and the US.
Montanstahl is going all-in on AI: a company-wide rollout is already underway, and a portfolio of AI initiatives is taking shape across every department. They're now creating a senior role to own the technical foundation behind it, and we're recruiting on their behalf.
What the role is about
This is a hands-on role. You define the architecture and standards, while building AI solutions yourself, working closely with IT, developers, ERP specialists, business process owners and external partners. You report directly into the C-level suite.
- You will evolve the architecture connecting enterprise data, applications, analytics and AI services.
- You will lead secure system integration across ERP, legacy apps, Microsoft 365 and cloud, via APIs and ETL/ELT.
- You will drive data governance: quality, ownership, classification, cataloguing, lineage, retention and access control.
- You will own the AI initiative portfolio end to end: scoping, prioritizing and delivering initiatives with measurable value, from prototype to production.
- You will be the technical reference for approved LLMs (OpenAI, Claude), enabling use cases, training users and managing access.
- You will make the calls on new AI and data tools: value, feasibility, security, data protection, compliance.
- You will define architecture principles and development standards, guide the technical team, and support collaboration with internal teams and external partners.
Immediate priorities
- Information migration & governance: Lead the migration from on-premises file servers to SharePoint Online, covering architecture, ownership, permissions, retention, governance and DLP.
- Applied AI solutions: Deliver focused AI projects with real operational value, for example extracting data from supplier quality certificates into the ERP via APIs.
- Responsible AI adoption: Support departments in adopting approved AI tools, turning experimentation into repeatable, governed processes.
- AI-ready data platform: Evaluate, and if appropriate implement, a governed data platform (such as a data lake) for reliable, secure, traceable data.
What you bring
- Building enterprise architecture: You have 5+ years in enterprise applications architecture, integration or a related technical role.
- Owning APIs & data integration: You know REST APIs, ETL/ELT, orchestration, monitoring and error handling inside out.
- Running a data platform: You've designed, built or operated one in production, not just read about it.
- Practicing real data governance: Quality, ownership, classification, cataloguing, lineage, retention, access, DLP.
- Shipping practical GenAI: You've built LLM apps with real users, covering retrieval, agentic workflows, structured extraction and evaluation.
- Judging technology & risk: You weigh value against feasibility, security, data protection and maintainability.
- Communicating across audiences: You can explain complex concepts clearly to technical and business stakeholders alike.
- Working with high autonomy: You lead initiatives across departments, internal teams and external partners.
- Speaking Italian and English: Good working proficiency in both.
Nice to have: Microsoft ecosystem experience (Fabric, Azure AI Foundry, M365, SharePoint Online, Power Platform), hands-on work with OpenAI & Anthropic platforms, and a background in industrial or manufacturing environments with ERP/MES systems.
How the role works
- AI-native approach: You use AI tools effectively and keep finding ways they improve your own work.
- Hands-on leadership: You set direction and turn it into working solutions, lifting others along the way.
- Pragmatic solving: Solutions that deliver measurable value and stay maintainable.
- User orientation: You translate business needs into clear technical solutions.
- Security by design: Security, data protection, governance and risk are part of every initiative.
- Ownership & collaboration: Responsibility for outcomes, and clear work across teams and partners.
What Montanstahl offers
- High-Impact Role: Shape the AI, data and integration architecture.
- Established Environment: Experienced IT, developers and ERP specialists.
- Growth & Learning: Time and budget for the latest AI tooling.
- Direct Access to Leadership: A C-level reporting line and short decision paths.
- Work-Life Balance: A hybrid, flexible working model.
- Work Where Others Vacation: Based in Ticino on the Swiss-Italian border, minutes from Lake Lugano, with Milan under an hour away.
This search is run by One Thousand on behalf of Montanstahl SA. You'd be joining Montanstahl's team directly, not ours.
Sounds like a "wow" opportunity? We can't wait to hear from you.
Show us what you've built: send your CV and a short introduction to [email protected]. If you can, include an example of something you've built, or briefly describe a relevant project, your role in it, and the business outcome achieved.