Senior/Staff Electrical Engineer, Avionics

As a Senior Avionics Electrical Engineer at Zipline, you will own electrical hardware for aircraft and ground support systems from architecture through design, validation, release, production ramp, and fleet support. You will design and develop PCBAs, bring up new boards, lead root-cause investigations, and collaborate with cross-functional teams to ensure hardware is safe, robust, and manufacturable. This hands-on role involves carrying hardware from first prototype to reliable fielded product, working closely with electrical, mechanical, firmware, software, manufacturing, and operations teams.

Responsibilities

• Own avionics electrical subsystems from concept through design, validation, release, production ramp, and field support.
• Design and develop PCBAs for aircraft and ground-support hardware, including digital, analog, sensing, communications, power, and control circuits.
• Create and review schematics, select components, define interfaces, guide PCB layout, and ensure designs meet electrical, mechanical, thermal, manufacturing, and operational requirements.
• Bring up new boards, write and execute validation plans, analyze test data, and drive design changes based on measured performance.
• Lead root-cause investigations for electrical issues found during bring-up, qualification, manufacturing, flight test, or field operation.
• Own corrective-action plans for fleet or production issues, including containment, investigation, design revision, release, and verification.
• Partner with firmware and software teams on hardware-software interfaces, sensor integration, communications, diagnostics, and test hooks.
• Work with mechanical engineering on packaging, connectorization, cable routing, weight, thermal constraints, environmental exposure, and serviceability.
• Collaborate with manufacturing, test, quality, and supply-chain teams to improve yield, reduce downtime, resolve production blockers, and support supplier readiness.
• Define requirements, test procedures, design documentation, release packages, and change-control records for avionics hardware.
• Support design reviews, failure reviews, and technical tradeoff decisions across reliability, performance, cost, weight, power, schedule, and manufacturability.
• Mentor other engineers and help raise the quality of electrical design, validation, debugging, and release practices across the team.

Requirements

• Minimum 5 years experience designing and releasing electrical hardware for products that have shipped, flown, operated in the field, or otherwise seen real-world use.
• Strong electrical engineering fundamentals across analog, digital, mixed-signal, power, sensing, and communication circuits.
• Experience designing PCBAs, including schematic capture, component selection, design reviews, layout guidance, board bring-up, and design verification.
• Ability to debug complex electrical issues using oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, power supplies, electronic loads, protocol analyzers, and other lab equipment.
• Experience writing and executing test plans for design validation, qualification, production test, or reliability investigations.
• Strong root-cause analysis skills and the ability to move from ambiguous symptoms to clear technical conclusions and practical corrective actions.
• Working knowledge of PCB layout tradeoffs, signal integrity, power integrity, grounding, EMI/EMC, thermal behavior, and manufacturability.
• Ability to collaborate across electrical, mechanical, firmware, software, manufacturing, operations, quality, and supply-chain teams.
• Strong ownership instincts: you can drive a design or issue from unclear starting point to released, verified solution.
• Clear communication and documentation habits, especially when decisions affect safety, reliability, production, or fleet operations.
• Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.

Nice to have

• Experience with avionics, aerospace, drones, robotics, automotive electronics, satellites, or other high-reliability hardware.
• Experience with Altium Designer for schematic capture, PCB layout review, or release package generation.
• Experience designing for weight, power consumption, thermal limits, vibration, shock, EMI/EMC, environmental exposure, or high-volume manufacturing.
• Experience with Python, MATLAB, or similar tools for test automation, data analysis, or lab-equipment control.
• Familiarity with embedded firmware development in C or C++, especially for board bring-up, diagnostics, or hardware-software integration.
• Experience with CAN, UART, SPI, I2C, Ethernet, GNSS, radios, motor-control electronics, battery systems, or sensor interfaces.
• Familiarity with aerospace or environmental test practices such as DO-160, HALT, vibration, thermal cycling, or reliability growth testing.

Benefits

• The starting cash range for this role is $160,000 - $225,000. 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.