We’re living through one of the most significant shifts in software development in decades, one that underscores the growing need for trusted, scalable, and secure infrastructure. The CNCF ecosystem, with more than 200 open source projects, provides a foundation to build, run, observe, and secure modern workloads—containerized, virtualized, or AI-driven—empowering organizations worldwide to innovate with confidence. Cloud native is no longer emerging, it has become the default approach. And with AI rapidly reshaping workloads, infrastructure, and team responsibilities, the conversation in India has moved beyond adoption. The real question is, are engineering cultures ready to evolve alongside technology?
India is uniquely positioned to innovate and scale their talent pool in this next chapter. With a developer population among the largest and fastest growing in the world, the country’s cloud talent pool is projected to more than double from 600,000 in 2021 to over 1.5 million by 2025, according to NASSCOM. That growth is fuelled by increasing demand for cloud native infrastructure to support both digital transformation and AI innovation. But for India to fully capitalize on this momentum, it’s not just about increasing headcount. It’s about building teams that are adaptable, collaborative, and fluent in the complexities of modern systems.
Cloud Native Skills 2.0: A Cultural and Mindset Shift Beyond Tools
Across the CNCF ecosystem, we’re seeing a clear pattern: organizations have adopted tools like Kubernetes, Backstage, OpenTelemetry and service meshes. But the biggest hurdles now aren’t only technical but cultural. Many teams report friction not in the tech stack but in how developers collaborate, how security is integrated, and how fast teams can respond to incidents or change.
In India, where engineering talent is deep but often specialized, the opportunity is to go broad. The next wave of talent must understand not only how to deploy containers or monitor services but also how to design systems with observability, security, and automation built in from day one. More importantly, it is essential to understand how to work across infrastructure and application layers in order to break down silos that slow innovation.
This broader mindset, “Cloud Native Skills 2.0,” means engineers aren’t just tool operators. They’re system thinkers, cultural changemakers, and continuous learners. They understand that CI/CD isn’t just a pipeline; it’s a feedback loop that touches security, compliance, and developer experience.
From Certifications to Real-World Capability
Across APAC, similar challenges are emerging. The Linux Foundation’s recent 2025 Japan Tech Talent Report shows that only a third of workloads have moved to the public cloud despite strong intent to modernize, and 70% of organizations say they face critical cloud-related talent shortages. What’s notable, though, is the confidence that organizations place in internal training. Many report that upskilling existing employees achieves faster results than hiring externally. According to the 2025 State of Tech Talent report by the Linux Foundation, organizations are 3.2 times more likely to invest in upskilling existing talent than to hire externally. Upskilling is also 38% faster on average than traditional hiring and onboarding—a critical advantage in a fast-moving, AI-driven environment. These insights are simple but powerful: when we invest in our people, the payoff is quicker and more sustainable.
Training and certifications have necessary value. They establish a baseline and signal commitment. But real fluency in cloud native comes from doing: building platforms, solving production issues, and collaborating across disciplines. CNCF’s Kubestronaut Program, focuses on continued Kubernetes and cloud native education, is seeing vast progress in regions such as India. India specifically has 180 Kubestronauts and 2 Golden Kubestronauts, marking the country as having the highest number of the world’s total Kubestonauts. This designation means developers have successfully passed 5 certifications to reach the first level and 13 certifications total to reach Golden Kubestronaut level. It’s with training and continued education such as this that can elevate the confidence of individuals and teams.
In India, this is especially relevant:
- System thinking: Understanding the full lifecycle of cloud native systems.
- Cross-functional fluency: Working across infrastructure, application layers, and developer workflows.
- DevSecOps leadership: Integrating security seamlessly and promoting collaborative development.
- Cultural agility: Leading change and improving team dynamics to reduce silos.
- Continuous learning: Staying adaptable in the face of evolving tools and architectures. The country has a long-standing reputation for technical depth, and its engineers are among the most sought after globally. But in today’s cloud native era, technical depth alone is not enough. What is needed now is breadth such as the ability to work across infrastructure, application layers, and developer workflows. This also entails cultivating engineers capable of spearheading cultural transformations, advocating for DevSecOps methodologies, and fostering collaboration among previously isolated teams.
India’s technology ecosystem is already moving in this direction. We’re seeing growing interest in platform engineering as a distinct discipline, a sharper focus on developer experience (DevEx), and a more strategic approach to how teams are structured. But there’s room to accelerate progress. Companies must look beyond external hiring and certifications and focus on building internal academies, pairing mentorship with real-world projects, and creating hands-on labs that enable engineers to experiment and fail safely. Cloud native fluency doesn’t come from textbooks; it comes from practice and even open source experience.
AI and Cloud Native: A Convergence India Can Lead
As AI workloads grow, the operational complexity only increases. Running inference pipelines on Kubernetes, managing GPU scheduling, and integrating observability around model behavior are challenges Indian engineers are well equipped to tackle.
Yet, a significant capability gap remains. The 2025 State of Tech Talent Report also shows that 68% of organizations are understaffed in AI/ML, 65% in cybersecurity, and 56% in platform engineering, domains that are essential for modern infrastructure. While organizations globally are still figuring out how to run scalable AI on cloud native platforms, India’s developer community, with its strong foundation in software engineering and hunger for learning, has an opportunity to help define the best practices.
But that also requires a shift in focus. AI infrastructure isn’t just about hardware or frameworks. It’s also about building reliable, secure pipelines that integrate with existing systems. Engineers will need to think holistically: how does this model impact latency? Can we trust its output in production? How do we audit or roll back decisions?
Projects like Kubernetes, which orchestrates containerized AI workloads; OpenTelemetry, which provides observability of model performance and system behavior; and Kubeflow, which streamlines the development and deployment of machine learning pipelines, are part of this puzzle, but success lies in integration, not just tool choice. That’s where skill development must focus: on patterns, not products.
Security: Built In, Not Bolted On
Security also must be front and center. Even as cloud native tooling becomes more intuitive, the complexity of modern software supply chains and the growing need for zero-trust architectures mean that security can no longer be bolted on at the end. Instead, it must be surrounded by design. Indian developers will need to grow not just as coders but as security-minded engineers who understand the principles of secure collaboration.
Notably, 84% of organizations surveyed in the 2025 State of Tech Talent said that embracing open source culture significantly improves talent retention. Open source contributions offer engineers both a technical edge and a path for career differentiation. Ultimately, Cloud Native Skills 2.0 is not just a technical upgrade; it’s a cultural one. It’s about rethinking how we teach, how we work, and how we grow. With the right support, intentional training strategies, and a shift toward collaborative security-aware development, India can not only meet the demands of today’s digital era, but it can also help shape what comes next.
Looking Ahead: Building for Sustainability and Scale
Ultimately, cloud native isn’t just about scale; it’s also about sustainable technical change. It’s about giving teams the ability to innovate confidently, recover quickly, and work across systems with clarity and trust. For India’s developers, this means focusing less on chasing the latest technology trend and more on creating the right environment for engineers to grow.
The future of cloud native talent isn’t just technical, but human. It’s about how we teach, how we collaborate, and how we lead. And with the right investment in internal capability, cultural alignment, and community engagement, India is poised not just to meet the demands of the digital era but help to define them.
The article has been written by By Chris Aniszczyk, CTO, Cloud & Infrastructure, The Linux Foundation
