Failure Analysis Engineer - Materials

Zipline•South San Francisco, CA

12h•$125,000 - $240,000•Onsite

About The Position

Zipline is hiring a Failure Analysis Engineer to own the triage, execution, and technical conclusions of investigations into consequential hardware failures. The role determines what failed, how and why it failed, and what physical evidence supports the conclusion. Findings will inform product reliability, fleet health, design decisions, supplier controls, qualification testing, manufacturing processes, and future product architecture. The engineer will work across engineering and operations, owning physical investigations and technical conclusions while partnering with responsible teams on root cause, containment, corrective actions, validation, and issue closure. The position is based at Zipline’s manufacturing and test lab facility in South San Francisco. It involves laboratory investigations, technical reviews, coordination with external laboratories, and communicating failure mechanisms to teams across the company.

Requirements

At least 3 years of hands-on experience in Failure Analysis, Materials Science, Materials Engineering, or a related hardware engineering discipline.
Demonstrated experience independently investigating hardware failures and developing defensible conclusions from physical evidence.
Hands-on experience with multiple Failure Analysis and materials characterization techniques, such as optical microscopy, SEM/EDS, metallography and cross-sectioning, CT/X-ray inspection, FTIR, hardness testing, mechanical testing, DSC, TGA, or similar methods.
Strong understanding of material failure mechanisms, including fracture, fatigue, corrosion, wear, material degradation, manufacturing defects, and environmentally assisted failure.
Deep expertise in Failure Analysis for at least one major class of engineering materials or hardware, such as metals, polymers, adhesives, coatings, solder systems, composites, or electronic/mechanical assemblies.
Ability to apply first-principles analytical reasoning across unfamiliar materials and failure mechanisms.
Ability to design an investigation from first principles.
Must be eligible to work in the US.
Must-have traits include deep curiosity, a clear owner mentality, disciplined evidence handling and documentation, strong technical judgment, comfort operating with incomplete information, and a bias toward finding the simplest investigation that can decisively answer the engineering question.

Nice To Haves

Experience developing laboratory methods, technical documentation, databases, or institutional Failure Analysis processes.
Experience working with external analytical laboratories and suppliers.

Responsibilities

Lead evidence-based investigations of consequential test, manufacturing, supplier, and field failures; determine physical failure mechanisms and establish confidence in conclusions.
Own Failure Analysis cases from intake through technical conclusion, including hardware handling, inspection strategy, test sequencing, laboratory execution, external lab coordination, documentation, and communicating results.
Preserve and develop physical evidence using appropriate inspection and analytical workflows, while maintaining traceability throughout the process.
Identify material- and manufacturing-driven failure mechanisms, including fatigue, overload, corrosion, stress-corrosion cracking, embrittlement, wear, delamination, porosity, contamination, processing defects, and coating failures.
Build standardized Failure Analysis workflows, report formats, evidence-handling practices, confidence assessments, and failure-mechanism nomenclature.
Build and maintain a centralized, searchable body of Failure Analysis knowledge to track and connect recurring mechanisms across programs.
Partner with design, manufacturing, reliability, supplier quality, test, systems, and operations teams so findings inform design standards, supplier requirements, qualification testing, inspection criteria, maintenance strategy, and fleet decisions.
Review proposed corrective actions and provide technical expertise and evidence to assess whether they address the identified physical failure mechanism.
Drive investigation quality and coverage, prevent repeat failure mechanisms, identify recurring patterns across programs, and improve or de-risk engineering decisions using Failure Analysis evidence.