Forward Deployed AI Engineer, Community Engagement

Zipline•South San Francisco, CA

1d•$112,500 - $300,000•Onsite

About The Position

Zipline is looking for Forward Deployed AI Engineers, Community Engagement, who will be at the forefront of bringing GenAI into one of the most complex real-world logistics systems in the world. We operate across software, hardware, aviation, robotics, healthcare, commerce, and field operations, which means the work is practical, high-stakes, and directly tied to production outcomes. This role is similar to being a hands-on AI startup CTO inside Zipline: you report directly to the Head of Operations, work in a small team, own delivery of important projects, move quickly from problem discovery to shipped product, and partner directly with users. The impact will come less from demos and more from systems that are adopted, trusted, and used in daily operations.

Requirements

Past experience building things that work.
Resume highlights what you have built, shipped, automated, scaled, or made real.
Engineering mindset focused on delivering production AI systems, not academic benchmarks.
Experience building with LLMs, data processing pipelines, and analytics tools.
Comfortable decomposing messy business problems into reliable technical workflows.
Past experience building GenAI solutions.
Strong understanding of the AI landscape.
Solid foundation in machine learning basics such as evaluation, training concepts, and problem decomposition.
Strong coder, with proficiency in Python, TypeScript/JavaScript, Java, C++, or similar languages.
Comfortable collaborating with technical and non-technical teammates.
Comfortable working in dynamic environments.
Comfortable iterating directly with users.

Nice To Haves

Ability and interest in traveling to Zipline sites as needed is helpful up to 50% depending on the organization you’ll be deployed into.
Experience building for non-technical users, stakeholder mapping, communications workflows, sentiment analysis, issue tracking, customer operations, or field operations is especially helpful.

Responsibilities

Own GenAI strategy and implementation for high-impact operational workflows and teams.
Build end-to-end AI tools, take them to production, and solve real-world problems across aviation, logistics, fulfillment, maintenance, customer operations, and commercial teams.
Work closely with operators, engineers, product teams, and business leaders to understand user needs, define the right technical approach, and implement solutions that improve how Zipline runs.
Bring learnings from the field back into Zipline’s broader AI tooling, platforms, and best practices.
Focus on stakeholder mapping, local briefings, first-responder and economic-development engagement, community narratives, event preparation, complaint management, sentiment tracking, launch support, and post-launch follow-through.