Field Systems Engineer Intern (Spring 2027)

Zipline•South San Francisco, CA

4h•Onsite

About The Position

Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service, aiming to serve all humans equally by providing access to essential goods. They design, build, and operate an autonomous logistics system, making deliveries globally. The company has flown over 140 million autonomous miles and is redefining access to healthcare, consumer products, and food. Zipline seeks practical problem solvers motivated by building systems with a meaningful impact and scaling the future of logistics. The Avionics team focuses on the electronics that enable Zipline's aircraft to sense, compute, communicate, and fly reliably. Field Systems Engineering bridges the gap between design and fleet operations, investigating failures, analyzing flight data, and collaborating with engineers and operators to improve the product. This role involves hardware, software, and daily operations, offering direct learning from those maintaining and flying the aircraft.

Requirements

Currently pursuing a degree in electrical engineering, computer engineering, aerospace engineering, robotics, computer science, or a related field.
Experience with hands-on technical projects involving hardware, software, or both.
Ability to analyze data or logs using Python, SQL, MATLAB, or a similar tool.
Curiosity about how complex systems fail and a methodical approach to finding answers.
Clear communication and willingness to learn from engineers, technicians, and operators.
Must be proficient and comfortable with using and building AI tools.

Nice To Haves

Experience using CAD software to design, modify, or inspect mechanical parts and assemblies.
Hands-on experience building, testing, and debugging a physical system, such as through Formula SAE, Baja SAE, a robotics team, research, or a personal project.

Responsibilities

Investigate avionics issues using telemetry, logs, physical inspection, and bench tests.
Analyze fleet data to identify patterns in system performance and reliability.
Build or improve scripts, dashboards, or diagnostic tools that make issues easier to detect and understand.
Help design and run tests to check possible failure causes and proposed fixes.
Work with design engineers, technicians, and operators to learn how systems behave in practice.
Document methods, results, and recommendations so others can act on them.