Senior-Staff Mechanical Design Engineer (All Teams)

Zipline•South San Francisco, CA

7d•Onsite

About The Position

This posting represents multiple Senior to Staff Mechanical Design Engineering opportunities across Zipline's Engineering organization. Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service, aiming 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. This role involves working on large integrated electro-mechanical systems from conception through scaled production and global deployment. Mechanical Design Engineers are responsible for creating novel, robust designs that meet functional requirements and withstand harsh environments. They own their hardware, manage projects on short timelines, and oversee designs into production, ensuring manufacturability, inspectability, and scalability. Collaboration with Software, Integration, Production, Suppliers, and Test teams is essential.

Requirements

5-15+ years of full-time working experience in designing electromechanical and structural assemblies.
Proven track record of designing complex subassemblies or full systems over at least two product programs.
Demonstrated CAD fluency for system-level ownership (3D/2D of 20–30 parts simultaneously).
Experience working with suppliers and seeking DFM feedback.
Experience working on structural components and mechanisms.
Demonstrated core competencies: GD&T, FEA (multi-body structural and thermal), design for assembly and field ops.
Prototyping experience and quick iterations on owned projects.
Ability to bound problems with hand calcs (beam, buckling, bolted joints, etc.).
Knowledge of appropriate safety margins for human safety critical applications.
Excellent written, verbal, and visual communication skills.
Experience with high-volume electromechanical assemblies, including PCBA layouts and sensor hardware including cameras, air data sensors, etc. (Avionics team).
Experience with high-volume electromechanical assemblies, including PCBA enclosures, batteries, and connectors (Battery and Power Distribution team).
Familiarity with electric motors, electromagnetics, and brushless DC motor control (Electric Motors and Propulsion team).
Structural design including hand calcs and FEA (Towers team).
Experience with design for electronics packaging/harnessing, actuators, mechanisms (Dock and Zipping Point team).

Nice To Haves

NX as your primary CAD tool
Aerospace or automotive-level validation experience
Comfortable with data analysis
Prior technical mentorship
Testing experience (test plans, execution, analysis)
Bonus: carbon fiber structures in high-volume production (Electric Motors and Propulsion team)
Bonus: large structural steel, dynamic transient FEA (Towers team)

Responsibilities

Design novel, robust electro-mechanical and structural assemblies.
Own hardware from conception through scaled production and global deployment.
Manage projects on short timelines.
Oversee designs into production, ensuring manufacturability, inspectability, and scalability.
Work seamlessly with Software, Integration, Production, Suppliers, and Test teams.
Identify worst-case loads and create quick test setups.
Perform prototyping and quick iterations on owned projects.
Ensure designs meet design requirements.
Provide DFM feedback when working with suppliers.
Conduct first principles thermal design (Avionics, Battery and Power Distribution teams).
Experience with rotor dynamics, vibrational loads, durability cycling (Electric Motors and Propulsion team).
Design of mass-efficient carbon fiber, metallic, and plastic structures (Structures and Mechanisms team).
Design and testing of reliable servo mechanisms (Structures and Mechanisms team).
Welding design (AWS 1.1), sheet metal design, electrical integration (Towers team).
Structural design including hand calcs and FEA (Towers team).
Experience with design for electronics packaging/harnessing, actuators, mechanisms (Dock and Zipping Point team).
Sheet metal and plastic design (Dock and Zipping Point team).