Electrical Engineering Intern (Summer 2026)

Zipline•South San Francisco, CA

7h•Onsite

About The Position

Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service, on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. They 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 to date, including blood, vaccines, medical supplies, food, and retail products. Their customers include the world’s largest and most prominent healthcare systems, governments, retailers, restaurants and global businesses who rely on them to save lives, reduce emissions, increase economic opportunity, and provide delivery from point A to point B as fast as possible. The drone is only 15% of what they’ve built to enable seamless, reliable, global operations. Their system strengthens supply chains, reduces congestion, and gives people time back. With more than 140 million commercial autonomous miles safely flown, Zipline is redefining access to healthcare, consumer products, and food across the globe. They operate at a global scale and are looking for practical problem solvers who thrive on real-world challenges and rapid growth. Their team is motivated by building systems that have a direct, meaningful impact on people’s lives and by scaling the future of logistics. They are seeking people who sculpt from first principles, enjoy facing adversity, and can do the impossible at record breaking speeds. At Zipline, the Electrical Engineering Teams are at the heart of their flight and ground systems, responsible for designing, building, and testing all the electronics and software that goes into a scaled instant logistics system. From custom circuit board design, EOL tester development, and sensor integration to real-time flight control and communication systems, the team ensures their platforms operate safely and effectively in some of the most challenging environments in the world. The team works cross-functionally with mechanical, test, embedded, software, and systems engineering teams to create scalable, high-performance products that power life-saving missions every day. Leading the way in drone delivery often means exceeding the capabilities of what's available off the shelf, and as a result Zipline is engineering the majority of their system in-house. Doubling down on the reliability of their systems is critical to delivering to their next billion customers--people whose lives will be meaningfully affected by smarter, more equitable access. They are deliberately expanding their electrical design and test capabilities and adding to the ranks of their experienced team to achieve these goals. They need dedicated engineers to burn down risk and improve reliability in their system like their life depends on it, because others' lives do. Electronics are where software meets the physical world, and so their electrical engineering team has a wide array of engineering skills and works with a variety of different teams. They need people who are comfortable working in different domains, thrive when working on a problem as part of a small group, and are able to communicate technical concepts clearly to a wide variety of stakeholders--software and mechanical engineers, hardware test and manufacturing, and operations and field support, to name a few. Their small team can get a lot done because their team members are strong individual contributors with a good grasp of electrical engineering fundamentals and the ability to define requirements for their systems, rapidly develop creative and simple solutions, and prove with testing that their work meets the rigors and edge-cases of real-world deployment.

Requirements

Must have at least completed the second year of your Undergraduate studies. Masters and PhD students are also eligible.
You've designed and tested a custom circuit board (it doesn't need to have worked - we'd love to hear about it!)
You've worked on a project in or out of school that moved under its own power (plane, car, boat, quadcopter, rocket, balloon, rocket on a balloon, submarine, rover, etc. - we're not picky)
You've collaborated on the above two things as part of a group - school club, competition team, as part of a job/internship, or just with friends
In your application, we'd love to see either a sample of work you're proud of or a short note about your prior experience and how it relates to the three points above.

Nice To Haves

Experience in Robotics/Automation: Prior exposure to robotics systems, automation, or sensor data (through coursework, projects, or clubs) is a plus.
Software Development: Exposure to object-oriented programming (e.g., C++ or Java) is a bonus.
Cloud Computing/Big Data Tools: Familiarity with cloud services (AWS, GCP, Azure) or big data tools (Spark, Hadoop) is helpful but not required.

Responsibilities

Prototyping new versions of our battery charging electronics to meet harsher environmental requirements in new countries where we're launching our service
Architecting ground support electronics to assist the air vehicle with take-off and landing
Developing and deploying test equipment such as EOL’s for design validation and production
Supporting design validation campaigns to ensure that our avionics products meet design and reliability requirements
Root cause investigation for our products from test, flight, or field issues.