Rahul

Senior Network Engineer with progressive experience across enterprise LAN/WAN, data centers, carrier networks, hybrid cloud, and infrastructure security, moving from hands-on branch deployments into large-scale network modernization, cloud connectivity, production incident ownership, and cross-functional design work for business-critical environments. Deep routing and WAN experience with BGP, MP-BGP, OSPF, EIGRP, MPLS, VRF, HSRP/VRRP, QoS, and Cisco Viptela SD-WAN, including vManage/vSmart/vBond, OMP, TLOCs, path selection, route control, failover behavior, and troubleshooting across branches, datacenter, carrier, and cloud-connected networks.

Strong

Cisco background across Catalyst 2960/3560/3750/9300/9500, Nexus 7000/9000, ISR, ASR, and ASR 9000 platforms, covering switching, routing, high availability, data-center connectivity, software lifecycle work, migrations, capacity changes, and production support in geographically distributed enterprise environments. Hands-on Juniper MX and Junos experience in carrier and core-routing environments, working with BGP/MPLS, MP-BGP, VRFs, routing policies, prefix controls, interface configuration, route validation, and troubleshooting while integrating Juniper routing with Cisco, firewall, load balancing, and transport infrastructure. Data-center networking experience with VXLAN EVPN, BGP EVPN, spine-leaf architecture, VNI/VTEP, VRF, vPC, LACP, and Nexus 9000, supporting workload migrations, scalable segmentation, high availability, and fault isolation across both the underlay routing and overlay control planes.

Hybrid and multi-cloud networking experience across Microsoft Azure and AWS, with Azure Virtual WAN, ExpressRoute, VPN Gateway, and VNet Peering used for Azure modernization and AWS VPC, Transit Gateway, Direct Connect, and Site-to-Site VPN used for separate cloud-integration requirements across enterprise datacenter and WAN environments. Network-security experience across Palo Alto/Panorama, Fortinet FortiGate, Check Point, Cisco ASA, and Zscaler ZIA/ZPA, with hands-on work spanning NGFW policy, App-ID, security zones, NAT, ACLs, threat prevention, GlobalProtect/IPSec, secure Internet access, and private-application access rather than treating each platform as an interchangeable firewall stack. Experienced with Zero Trust, SASE, and NAC using Zscaler ZIA/ZPA and Cisco ISE, including App Connectors, 802.1X, EAP-TLS, MAB, dynamic VLAN assignment, and identity-aware access controls, with troubleshooting across authentication, DNS, routing, policy, connector health, and application reachability for wired, wireless, and remote-access users.

Enterprise campus and wireless networking experience with Cisco Catalyst 9300/9500, Catalyst 9800 WLC, Cisco APs, Aruba Wireless, Cisco ISE, and ClearPass, supporting VLAN/trunk design, AP onboarding, SSID and policy configuration, 802.1X/MAB authentication, roaming and client-connectivity troubleshooting, and wired/wireless access integration across large multi-sit

Senior Network Engineer at BLUE CROSS BLUE SHIELD (2024-10 – Present)

Healthcare

• Improved hybrid-cloud failover by tuning BGP path preference across ExpressRoute and backup VPN routes, bringing selected Azure application paths from roughly 45-60 seconds of recovery to about 15-20 seconds during controlled edge and circuit tests; route convergence and application reachability were verified before the change was accepted into production.
• Reduced a typical Azure migration network-validation cycle from roughly 75-90 minutes to about 25-30 minutes by automating route, interface, tunnel, DNS, and reachability checks with Python/Ansible and reusable pre/post-change commands, giving the team a consistent way to compare state before traffic was moved and after cutover.
• Brought network-side fault isolation on recurring P1/P2 cases from about 50-60 minutes to roughly 25-30 minutes by correlating ThousandEyes path data, Splunk events, SolarWinds alarms, Panorama sessions, Azure Monitor, and packet captures, which made it faster to separate routing, NAT, DNS, tunnel, firewall, and backend failures during incident bridges.
• Worked with application, cloud, cybersecurity, server, database, and infrastructure teams to map source/destination networks, ports, protocols, DNS dependencies, NAT requirements, routing paths, and load-balancer flows before Azure migrations, turning application requirements into practical network and security changes that could be tested and rolled back cleanly.
• Reviewed datacenter and cloud topology, route propagation, overlapping address space, security boundaries, failure domains, and application dependencies before each migration wave, then built implementation sequences for Azure Virtual WAN, ExpressRoute, VPN Gateway, and VNet Peering that preserved existing service paths while workloads moved into Azure.
• Engineered and maintained routing across enterprise and cloud domains using BGP, OSPF, VRFs, prefix filters, route policies, static routes, and controlled redistribution, resolving missing prefixes, route-selection conflicts, asymmetric paths, and unintended advertisements between campus, datacenter, partner, and cloud-connected networks.
• Configured and supported Cisco Catalyst 9300/9500 and Nexus 9000 infrastructure, including VLANs, SVIs, trunks, LACP/EtherChannel, HSRP, vPC, routed interfaces, and redundant uplinks; routine work included capacity changes, gateway moves, interface turn-ups, failure testing, and post-change verification during application and infrastructure migrations.
• Administered Palo Alto PA-Series firewalls through Panorama, building and reviewing zones, App-ID rules, address/service objects, NAT, threat-prevention profiles, logging, and inter-zone access while troubleshooting firewall-related path failures and security policy gaps.