Senior Electrical Engineer - Avionics (RF)

Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced autonomous delivery service, founded to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to essential goods anytime, anywhere. We design, build, and operate the world’s largest autonomous logistics system, delivering critical supplies quickly and reliably. Today, Zipline operates on four continents, makes a delivery somewhere in the world every 30 seconds, and has completed millions of deliveries including blood, vaccines, medical supplies, food, and commercial products. Our customers include healthcare systems, governments, retailers, and global brands who rely on us to save lives, reduce emissions, increase economic opportunity, and provide new logistics services at scale.

Our technology goes beyond drones. We deploy integrated logistics infrastructure that strengthens supply chains, reduces congestion, and enables instant delivery, transforming how essential goods reach people everywhere. With more than 140 million commercial autonomous miles safely flown, Zipline is redefining access to healthcare, consumer products, and food across the globe.

We operate at a global scale and are looking for practical problem solvers who thrive on real-world challenges and rapid growth. Our team is motivated by building systems that have a direct, meaningful impact on people’s lives and by scaling the future of logistics.

About You and The Role  

The Avionics team is a group of hardware and software experts responsible for designing robust systems that control our life-saving drone delivery service in some of the toughest environments on Earth. Our team designs aircraft avionics that must excel in a wide range of harsh, real-world climates and electromagnetic interference (EMI) environments. The Avionics system is a vital part of the overall zipline aircraft system architecture, where we strive to achieve high performance and reliability while minimizing mass and cost.

You and your team will be responsible for delivering high performance communication and  navigation systems that are tightly integrated into the Avionics flight computer. These radio systems are at the core of a new unmanned aerial system that will enable Zipline’s impact to expand from 100,000 deliveries/year to 100 million across the globe.  Zipline’s future success depends on the development of avionics systems that are low mass, low cost, high reliability, and produced at high volumes. Rigorous design engineering and validation is required, as well as ingenuity in approaches to packaging, integration, fault tolerance, and validation.

We are looking for a leader with a strong foundation in RF system design and an excellent grasp of communication system design, RF electronics, and antenna design.

What You'll Do  

• Join a small but mighty team of RF engineers owning RF communications at Zipline. This includes Zip to Zip, Zip to Dock, Zip to Droid, and Zip to GA Aircraft. Today, we use tightly integrated 802.11, cellular, ADS-B, and GNSS radio systems.
• Develop and implement RF engineering processes to ensure high quality on tight, deterministic timelines.
• Provide technical leadership in system level design spanning RF link budgets, interference analysis, and RF MAC layer.
• Define, trade, revisit, and update vehicle RF architecture. Optimize at the integrated vehicle and fleet system levels.
• Design radios, amplifiers, filters, and antennas to meet RF architecture and requirements.
• Develop confirmation tests, including functional, end of line, and system level tests to ensure the RF systems meet all the necessary specifications.
• Coordinate regulatory and industry certification for domestic and international markets.
• Coordinate within the Avionics and Ground Systems teams to implement the RF systems in the aircraft highly integrated flight computer as well as the Zip Dock.
• Coordinate across teams such as GNC, Aero, and Perception to determine requirements for the RF system performance, identify trades, and ensure reliable operation for downstream systems.
• Ongoing engineering to successfully sustain the operation of existing avionics systems in our existing fleet of thousands of aircraft.

What You'll Bring 

• Demonstrated skill building and leading a team of engineers to achieve ambitious goals, with proven success
• 3-10 years of experience in RF engineering roles
• Past success developing electronics for critical systems in fields such as automotive, aerospace, transportation, or medical devices.
• Deep design experience in one or more of the following areas: RF system design and analysis, antenna design, or practical implementation of complex RF systems.
• Strong understanding of communication system fundamentals including linear systems, signal processing, and communication theory.
• Familiarity with RF design tools such as ADS, CST, Microwave Office, MATLAB, or Simulink.
• Enthusiasm for collaborating in a fast paced, cross-functional environment.
• Clear communication skills and the ability to explain technical challenges and solutions to fellow engineers and non-engineers alike.
• Bachelors and/or Masters degree in Electrical Engineering, with focus on RF Comms and Design 
• Must be eligible to work in the US.
• Must be able to work in person at Zipline’s South San Francisco office.

What Else You Need to Know