Technical Program Manager, Flight Systems Platform

Zipline•South San Francisco, CA

6h•$124,000 - $210,000•Onsite

About The Position

Zipline is seeking a Technical Program Manager for Flight Systems Platform to partner with teams across Flight Software, Cloud Infrastructure, Data and ML, Autonomy, Maps, Validation, Application Software, and Operations. The role owns execution of cross-functional platform capabilities that help Zipline build, test, deploy, monitor, maintain, and scale autonomous aircraft fleets and supporting infrastructure. The portfolio spans cloud and on-premise infrastructure, OTA delivery, logging and telemetry, data and ML pipelines, simulation and HIL/SIL environments, CI and developer tooling, maps and serviceability systems, and site-level operational tooling. The Technical Program Manager makes dependencies, interfaces, sequencing, and tradeoffs visible and actionable across teams. The work is intended to improve engineering velocity, validation confidence, fleet availability, operational efficiency, and the safety and reliability of Zipline’s delivery network. The role requires technical depth in one or more platform domains and the ability to learn quickly, connect systems-level concerns, and drive decisions across organizational boundaries. The position requires presence in the South San Francisco office at least four days per week. The role includes occasional off-hours work for field tests or launches, on-call coordination for launches, and travel to test or customer sites up to 10%. The stated starting cash range is $124,000–$210,000, with separate ranges listed for Technical Program Manager ($124,000–$180,000) and Senior Technical Program Manager ($144,000–$210,000). Compensation may also include equity, overtime pay, discretionary annual or performance bonuses, sales incentives, and benefits.

Requirements

At least 6 years of technical program management experience owning platform programs serving multiple engineering teams, with demonstrated ownership of large migrations, automation, or validation initiatives.
Technical fluency in several of the following: cloud infrastructure, on-premise systems, CI/CD, distributed systems, embedded software, data platforms, ML infrastructure, simulation, hardware-in-the-loop testing, observability, or fleet operations.
Experience working on a hardware platform, such as robotics, automotive, or aviation.
Track record of delivering measurable velocity and reliability improvements with concrete metrics, such as reduced build or test time, SLO attainment, or HIL throughput gains; candidates should be prepared to share baseline-to-result examples during interviews.
Strong program control skills, including risk registers, Gantt or timeline ownership, rollout and rollback plans, runbooks, and structured postmortems with tracked remediation items.
Ability to make and defend tradeoffs involving performance, cost, and safety; experience convening technical and operations stakeholders and driving binding decisions.
Comfort with operational intensity, including on-call coordination for launches, occasional off-hours work for field tests or launches, and travel to test or customer sites up to 10%.
Presence in the South San Francisco office at least four days per week.
BS in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Systems Engineering, or equivalent experience.

Nice To Haves

Former software or systems engineer is strongly preferred.

Responsibilities

Own cross-functional programs from strategy through delivery, defining outcomes, milestones, success metrics, dependencies, risks, and decision points.
Lead complex migrations, rollouts, and architectural transitions across cloud, on-premise, vehicle, dock, tower, and site environments.
Drive improvements in platform reliability, scalability, latency, cost, test throughput, developer feedback loops, deployment success, and operational recovery.
Establish shared readiness criteria for launches and migrations, including validation coverage, observability, rollback plans, operational ownership, and safety-critical dependencies.
Make cross-functional tradeoffs explicit, balancing safety, reliability, performance, cost, fidelity, delivery speed, and operational complexity.
Create program operating mechanisms, including reviews, dependency tracking, risk registers, decision logs, executive updates, and measurable health dashboards.
Drive incident and postmortem follow-through, ensuring systemic corrective actions are prioritized, owned, measured, and closed.
Help teams turn shared platform capabilities into repeatable, self-service workflows for engineers, validators, technicians, and operators.
Manage schedules, resourcing, vendor dependencies, and escalation paths for programs with material impact on fleet or business timelines.
Scope, plan, and kick off a complex cross-functional program; deliver a major program milestone through a phased migration or rollout and launch readiness review; establish program dashboards and SLOs for platform health and developer velocity and identify priority improvement areas.