Director of Embedded Software

Do you want to change the world? Zipline is on a mission to transform the way goods move. Our aim is to solve the world’s most urgent and complex access challenges by building, manufacturing and operating the first instant delivery and logistics system that serves all humans equally, wherever they are. From powering Rwanda’s national blood delivery network and Ghana’s COVID-19 vaccine distribution, to providing on-demand home delivery for Walmart, to enabling healthcare providers to bring care directly to U.S. homes, we are transforming the way things move for businesses, governments and consumers. The technology is complex but the idea is simple: a teleportation service that delivers what you need, when you need it. Through our technology that includes robotics and autonomy, we are decarbonizing delivery, decreasing road congestion, and reducing fossil fuel consumption and air pollution, while providing equitable access to billions of people and building a more resilient global supply chain.

 

Join Zipline and help us to make good on our promise to build an equitable and more resilient global supply chain for billions of people.

About You and The Role 

We are looking for an experienced and dynamic individual to join our team as the Director of Embedded Software. In this role, you will lead the team responsible for the software stack from bare-metal through the operating system, firmware, peripheral drivers, core libraries, and the tools/test systems that enable Zipline to develop reliable, safety-critical embedded systems at high velocity. This spans from our aircraft, to ground infrastructure, and hardware testers with the goal of ensuring our drones achieve the highest standards of performance and reliability in some of the toughest environments on Earth. As an organization leader, you will report to the Head of Engineering.

The ideal candidate will have an outstanding technical background, and enjoys leading and growing engineers as they continue to revolutionize the supply chain and logistic industry.

What You'll Do  

• Lead, mentor and grow several teams of talented embedded engineers and leaders, providing a clear vision and ambitious goals, all while maintaining a stringent focus on technical excellence.
• Cultivate a high performance team culture that champions a bias to action and strives for radically simple designs.
• Provide technical leadership in system level design by bringing expertise in either Linux, Microcontrollers, or Real-Time Operating Systems.
• Collaborate across teams and disciplines to architect safety-critical systems, which include flight computers, radios, safety systems, communication buses, battery management and motor control systems.
• Establish and enforce best practices for embedded software development, code review, and documentation.
• Set the technical and product vision for the embedded team.
• Work closely with engineering leaders across disciplines around the design of our avionics, our software development lifecycle, our test strategy, to ultimately build a cohesive product.

What You'll Bring 

• Demonstrated success as a “lead-of-leads” where you have inspired, managed and grown high-performing engineering teams to deliver embedded software for world first safety-critical products.
• Deep technical expertise in embedded software engineering, with a track record of making impactful architectural-level contributions. We use Rust and C++ onboard, and python for tooling.
• Effective communication and collaboration skills to explain and motivate technical vision, technical challenges, and solutions to fellow engineers and non-engineers alike.

What Else You Need to Know