South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$150k–$250k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Software Validation, Robotic Systems, Perception, Motion Planning, Navigation
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$180k–$265k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: 3D Perception, Deep Learning, Computer Vision, Robotics Fundamentals, TensorRT
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$180k–$250k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Distributed Systems, API Design, AWS, Kubernetes, Streaming Systems
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$160k–$225k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Power Electronics Design, AC-DC Conversion, DC-DC Conversion, Battery Charging Systems, PCB Layout
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$180k–$220k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Technical Leadership, Test Hardware Design, Product Development Life Cycle, Root Cause Analysis, Validation Testing
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$150k–$190k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Partnership Management, Business Development, Customer Success, Strategic Planning, Cross-functional Collaboration
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$160k–$235k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Electronics Circuit Design, Schematic Capture, PCB Layout, Mixed-Signal PCB, High-Speed Digital PCB
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$160k–$225k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Design Management, Civil Engineering, Structural Engineering, Architecture, Infrastructure Design
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$170k–$210k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Control Algorithms, Estimation Algorithms, Embedded Systems, Flight Dynamics, Dynamic Modeling
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$135k–$180k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Full-cycle Recruiting, Executive Partnership, Workforce Planning, Talent Sourcing, Candidate Management
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Material Planning, Data Analysis, Excel, SQL, Python
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$135k–$180k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Full-cycle Recruiting, Strategic Sourcing, Stakeholder Management, Workforce Planning, Compensation Benchmarking
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$145k–$225k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Electromechanical Design, CAD, DFM, GD&T, FEA
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$180k–$270k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Systems Architecture, Fleet Orchestration, Real-time Systems, Simulation Platforms, Software Engineering
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$160k–$225k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Project Engineering, NPI, Cross-functional Leadership, Root Cause Analysis, Systems Engineering
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$100k–$130k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Cold Outreach, Pipeline Management, Relationship Building, Prospecting, Commercial Negotiation
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$150k–$200k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Supplier Industrialization, Design For Manufacturability, Lean Methodologies, Statistical Process Control, Should-Cost Modelling
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$175k–$250k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Construction Management, Strategic Planning, Contractor Management, Budgeting, Project Controls
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$160k–$200k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: Embedded Software Development, Rust, C++, C, Python
South San Francisco, California, United States · On-site
$170k–$210k/yr
About Zipline Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We des…
Skills: CI/CD, Bazel, Github Actions, Buildkite, Datadog
South San Francisco, California, United States • On-site
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Lead end-to-end software evaluation of autonomous drone delivery systems across domains like perception, navigation, and control. Develop tools, metrics, and validation strategies to ensure system reliability and safety from simulation to flight tests.
Requires a degree in Computer Science, Aerospace Engineering, or a related field with over 5 years of experience in software validation for robotic systems. Proficiency in Python, SQL, and safety-critical languages like C++ or Rust is essential.
Zipline is the world’s largest and most experienced drone delivery service. We are on a mission to serve all humans equally by ensuring access to food, medicine and essential goods anytime, anywhere. We design, build, and operate the world’s largest autonomous logistics system, delivering critical supplies quickly and reliably. Today, Zipline operates on four continents, makes a delivery somewhere in the world every 30 seconds, and has completed millions of deliveries to date, including blood, vaccines, medical supplies, food, and retail products.
Our customers include the world’s largest and most prominent healthcare systems, governments, retailers, restaurants and global businesses who rely on us to save lives, reduce emissions, increase economic opportunity, and provide delivery from point A to point B as fast as possible. The drone is only 15% of what we’ve built to enable seamless, reliable, global operations.
Our system strengthens supply chains, reduces congestion, and gives people time back. With more than 140 million commercial autonomous miles safely flown, Zipline is redefining access to healthcare, consumer products, and food across the globe.
We operate at a global scale and are looking for practical problem solvers who thrive on real-world challenges and rapid growth. Our team is motivated by building systems that have a direct, meaningful impact on people’s lives and by scaling the future of logistics. We are seeking people who sculpt from first principles, enjoy facing adversity, and can do the impossible at record breaking speeds.
As a Senior Software Systems Validation Engineer you will lead end-to-end software evaluation of Zipline’s autonomous drone delivery system. This system spans various domains, including sensor drivers, perception, navigation, guidance and control, motion planning, power management and actuator control.
As part of this evaluation, you will build tools, metrics and visualizations that highlight capability improvements, gaps, and regressions, and ultimately fast track engineering decision making for large scale deployments and operating domain expansion. Your scope may include aircraft performance, delivery operations, docking systems, and fleet orchestration.
You will evaluate and continuously improve validation practices, identifying areas where improvements to tools, methodologies, and processes can increase validation coverage, efficiency and precision while maintaining high development and deployment velocity. For this, you will collaborate closely with our embedded and autonomy software teams, systems engineering, data platform and test infrastructure teams, and ensure that our software behaviors function as intended in real-world scenarios.
You will, thus, be the bridge between Systems Engineering and Software Development at Zipline.
The starting cash range for this role is $150,000 - 250,000. Please note that this is a target, starting cash range for a candidate who meets the minimum qualifications for this role. The final cash pay for this role will depend on a variety of factors, including a specific candidate's experience, qualifications, skills, working location, and projected impact. The total compensation package for this role may also include: equity compensation; overtime pay; discretionary annual or performance bonuses; sales incentives; benefits such as medical, dental and vision insurance; paid time off; and more.
Zipline is an equal opportunity employer and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, ancestry, national origin, religion or religious creed, mental or physical disability, medical condition, genetic information, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, and related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, marital status, military or veteran status, citizenship, or other characteristics protected by state, federal or local law or our other policies.
We value diversity at Zipline and welcome applications from those who are traditionally underrepresented in tech. If you like the sound of this position but are not sure if you are the perfect fit, please apply!
Zipline was founded to create the first logistics system that serves all humans equally. Our aim is to solve the world’s most urgent and complex access challenges. Leveraging expertise in robotics and autonomy, Zipline designs, manufactures and operates the world’s largest automated delivery system. Zipline serves tens of millions of people around the world and is making good on the promise of building an equitable and more resilient global supply chain. From powering Rwanda’s national blood delivery network and Ghana’s COVID-19 vaccine distribution, to providing on-demand home delivery for Walmart and enabling leading healthcare providers to bring care into the home in the United States, Zipline is transforming the way goods move. By transitioning to clean, electric, instant logistics, we can decarbonize delivery, decrease road congestion, and reduce fossil fuel consumption and air pollution, while providing equitable access for billions of people. The technology is complex but the idea is simple: a teleportation service that delivers what you need, when you need it. Zipline is inspiring people, governments, and businesses to imagine what is possible when goods can move as seamlessly as information. To join the team, check out our career page: https://flyzipline.com/careers/
Offices: 333 Corey Way, South San Francisco, California 94080, US
Based on 124 listings with disclosed salaries, most transportation jobs in South San Francisco, CA pay between $120k–$250k per year. Individual offers vary with seniority, company size, and specialization.
There are currently 179 open transportation positions in South San Francisco, CA listed on Clera. New openings are added daily as companies post roles.
Companies currently hiring include Zipline, Avis Budget Group, Reyes Beverage Group, Allied Universal, DSV - Global Transport and Logistics, among others. Browse the listings above to see every active employer.
Yes — 5 of the 179 open transportation positions offer remote or hybrid work (1 remote, 4 hybrid).
Each listing links directly to the employer's application page. Apply early — fresh listings get the most recruiter attention in the first two weeks.
