Senior Drone Flight Controls Engineer

Zipline; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 180,000 - 230,000; Full time

Job summary

Zipline is the world's largest and most experienced drone delivery service. As a Staff Controls Engineer, you will own system-performance analysis for vehicle designs and collaborate with controls, flight test, hardware, manufacturing, and customer-facing teams to improve models and operational capability.

You will build robust control algorithms, define analysis approaches, evaluate designs with simulation and flight data, and lead cross-functional improvements that raise reliability of the

Qualifications

• Demonstrated expertise in controls, flight dynamics, system identification, or modeling of complex physical systems.
• Experience using high-fidelity simulations to evaluate performance and guide decisions.
• Experience analyzing flight-test data to validate models or improve designs.
• Ability to lead ambiguous technical problems from framing through analysis, recommendation, and cross-functional execution.

Responsibilities

• Own dynamic models of complex vehicle systems within Zipline's six-degree-of-freedom simulation.
• Build controls algorithms that are robust, performant, fault tolerant and deployable.
• Define analysis approaches that connect design choices, requirements, limitations, and environmental conditions to vehicle performance.
• Evaluate existing and future vehicle designs through simulation, flight-test data, and data from customer aircraft in the global fleet.
• Improve simulation fidelity by reconciling model predictions with observed flight behavior and identifying the highest-value gaps.
• Lead technical recommendations for controls, vehicle, and system design improvements with software, hardware, flight test, and manufacturing partners.
• Build reusable analysis tools that enable teams to investigate performance questions, compare design options, and make informed tradeoffs.
• Translate operational and customer insights into engineering priorities that improve the reliability and capability of the logistics network.

Skills

Controls engineering

Flight dynamics

System identification

Modeling complex systems

High-fidelity simulations

Data analysis

Cross-functional collaboration

Job description

Zipline is the world's largest and most experienced drone delivery service. As a Staff Controls Engineer, you will own system-performance analysis for vehicle designs and collaborate with controls, flight test, hardware, manufacturing, and customer-facing teams to improve models and operational capability.

You will build robust control algorithms, define analysis approaches, evaluate designs with simulation and flight data, and lead cross-functional improvements that raise reliability of the