Sr. Manager, Powertrain Test Engineering

Zipline; South San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 220,000 - 300,000; Full time

Job summary

Zipline, the world’s leading autonomous drone delivery company, seeks a Head of Powertrain Test Engineering to lead a team responsible for motor, propeller, and actuator testing across the full flight envelope. You will own test methods, thermal modeling, and reliability initiatives while partnering with design engineers to close loops on cooling and derating.

This role blends hands-on lab leadership with strategic direction, delivering data-driven insights to optimize performance for real-world

Qualifications

• 8+ years in hardware test engineering or propulsion development, including 2+ years in a leadership role.
• Hands-on experience testing electric motors (BLDC) and/or propellers.
• Strong motor thermal modeling and test correlation.
• Strong understanding of motor electromagnetics and loss mechanisms.
• Experience testing actuators or servo motors, including position/rate control and endurance.
• Strong reliability engineering methods: FMEA, life/Weibull, accelerated life testing.
• Experience designing or specifying large, complex test equipment (dynos, thrust stands, wind tunnels, environmental chambers).
• Strong data instrumentation and analysis skills (DAQ, sensors, signal conditioning).
• Proficiency in Python or equivalent for scripting and data analysis.
• Experience managing cross-functional test programs in fast-moving hardware programs.
• Hands-on problem solving; lab and test floor orientation.

Responsibilities

• Hire, lead, and grow a team of specialist test engineers and technicians.
• Develop multi-month test campaigns for motor performance across the flight envelope.
• Own test methods for motor electromagnetic performance and EMI/EMC behavior.
• Develop and validate thermal models against instrumented test data.
• Own propeller test programs for thrust, power, efficiency, and durability.
• Own actuator and servo motor test programs for flight-critical control surfaces.
• Apply reliability concepts to drive fault identification and design improvements.
• Drive failure analysis testing for field hardware and test failures.
• Partner with design engineering to develop large-scale test equipment (dynos, wind tunnels).
• Develop inputs for vehicle-level diagnostics and early warning systems.

Skills

Hardware test engineering

Reliability engineering

Powertrain testing

Test equipment design

Actuators and motors testing

Thermal modeling

Motor electromagnetics

Python scripting

Data analysis

Leadership

Education

Bachelor's degree in Mechanical/Aerospace/Electrical Engineering

Tools

Dynamometers

Thrust stands

Wind tunnels

Environmental chambers

DAQ systems

Sensor conditioning

Python scripting

Job description

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 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.

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 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.

About You And The Role

Zipline's electric powertrain system defines the performance of our delivery system, having direct impact on our wind and temperature performance, the maximum payload, and the total energy available. As the leader for Powertrain Test Engineering, you will be responsible for the deep characterization of powertrain components including performance, efficiency, and model validation. Your team is also responsible for durability testing for fatigue, wear‑out, and performance in the range of loads and forces experienced in flight.

Zipline's hardware components are optimized to the maximum possible, given extreme mass considerations and extreme temperature conditions driving bespoke materials, coating, structural design, and electromagnetic.

Your role is extremely high autonomy and decision‑making, and will work closely as part of design engineering cycles. The team is often the first to find major hardware capabilities and issues, therefore you are often on the front‑line for complex problem solving.

What You'll Do

• Hire, lead, and grow a team of specialist test engineers and technicians responsible for motor and actuator performance, propeller performance, and component qualification and life testing.
• Develop and drive multi-month test campaigns for BLDC motor performance (torque/speed curves, efficiency mapping, back‑EMF and cogging torque characterization) across the full flight envelope, including edge‑of‑envelope and failure‑mode conditions.
• Own test methods for motor electromagnetic performance: flux linkage, inductance, torque ripple, iron and copper losses, switching losses, hysteresis, demagnetization risk, and EMI/EMC behavior, partnering with Electrical and Controls Engineering to validate motor models against thrust testing and dynamometer data.
• Develop and validate thermal models against instrumented test data; design thermal test setups to characterize heat generation, dissipation paths, and thermal limits, and use results to close the loop with Design Engineering on cooling strategy and derating curves.
• Own propeller test programs including propeller performance (thrust, power, efficiency, acoustic signature) and structural durability, including fatigue and damage‑tolerance testing under representative and oscillatory loading.
• Own actuator and servo motor test programs for motors used in flight‑critical control surfaces and mechanisms, including position and rate accuracy, cogging torque, backlash, and bandwidth.
• Apply reliability concepts to drive rapid fault identification and design opportunities, including accelerated life testing and destructive testing.
• Drive failure analysis testing for field hardware and test failures.
• Partner with (or lead directly) equipment design engineering teams to develop large‑scale custom test equipment used in powertrain testing, including thrust testing, wind tunnels, and dynamometers.
• Develop inputs for vehicle‑level diagnostics to generate early warning systems for the commercial fleet, including novel algorithms to detect structural damage, wear‑out, and powertrain degradation.
• Push the team to greatness through first‑principles analysis, excellent technical judgment, deep understanding of how components are used, and fast execution with an emphasis on getting unblocked.

What You'll Bring

• 8+ years of experience in hardware test engineering, reliability engineering, or propulsion/powertrain development, including 2+ years in a people management or technical leadership role.
• Deep hands‑on experience testing electric motors (BLDC preferred) and/or propellers. You understand thrust, torque, power, and efficiency trade‑offs and how to instrument for them.
• Strong understanding of motor thermal modeling and test correlation.
• Strong understanding of motor electromagnetics, including factors affecting flux linkage, characterization of different motor losses, and how these properties are measured or inferred from test data.
• Experience testing actuators or servo motors, including position/rate control performance, endurance, and failure‑mode characterization.
• Strong grounding in reliability engineering methods: FMEA, life/Weibull analysis, accelerated life testing, and translating field/flight data into test requirements.
• Demonstrated experience designing or specifying large, complex test equipment, including dynamometers, thrust stands, wind‑generation systems, environmental chambers, or similar aerodynamic/mechanical test rigs.
• Working knowledge of aerodynamics and propeller theory sufficient to design representative test conditions and interpret results.
• Strong data instrumentation and analysis skills (DAQ systems, sensor selection, signal conditioning, statistical analysis of test data).
• Proficiency in Python or equivalent for scripting and data analysis.
• Experience managing cross‑functional test programs in fast‑moving hardware programs.
• A bias toward hands‑on problem solving; comfortable in the lab and on the test floor, not just in review meetings.
• Bachelor's degree in Mechanical, Aerospace, Electrical Engineering, or a related field (advanced degree a plus).

What Else You Need To Know

The starting salary for this position is $220,000 - $300,000. Zipline is an equal opportunity employer and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws or our own sensibilities.

We value diversity at Zipline and welcome applications from those who are traditionally underrepresented in tech.