Lead Production Equipment & Tooling Design Engineer
Zipline
Design
South San Francisco, CA, USA
USD 150k-180k / year + Equity
Posted on Apr 30, 2026
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 Zipline
Zipline is the world’s largest autonomous delivery system, built to provide fast, reliable access to medicine, food, and other essential goods. We design, build, and operate high-performance logistics systems that serve customers across healthcare, retail, and government on four continents.
Our Manufacturing Engineering team builds the production systems that turn complex designs into reliable, scalable hardware. We are looking for engineers who like solving practical problems, moving quickly, and building equipment that works in the real world.
About You And The Role
We are looking for a Lead Production Equipment & Tooling Design Engineer to design the fixtures, workstations, assembly tooling, and production equipment used to build Zipline products at scale.
This role is focused on hardware for the factory floor, with a mix of technical ownership and people leadership. You will lead a small group of equipment and tooling design engineers while remaining deeply hands-on in the work. This role is expected to be approximately 75% individual contributor and 25% leadership, with responsibility for both delivering critical tooling and equipment projects yourself and helping guide the team’s priorities, quality, and execution.
You will work closely with Manufacturing Engineering, Design Engineering, Quality, and Technicians to create tools and equipment that make assembly safer, faster, more repeatable, and easier to maintain. Typical projects may include alignment fixtures, press and torque tooling, ergonomic workstations, poka-yoke devices, handling tools, and end-of-line test equipment for electro-mechanical assemblies.
You will own projects from concept through production release: defining requirements, building CAD, releasing drawings, supporting fabrication, debugging equipment on the line, and improving designs after launch. You will also help develop the team by reviewing designs, mentoring engineers, and driving strong engineering standards across tooling and production equipment development.
What You’ll Bring
The starting cash range for this role is Salary range: $150,000 - $180,000.00. Please note that this is a target, starting cash range for a candidate who meets the minimum qualifications for this role. We are always open to negotiation. 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; 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, 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. If you like the sound of this position but are not sure if you are the perfect fit, please apply!
If you’d like to learn more about Zipline and our teams, feel free to check out our Instagram, one of our Reddit AMA’s, or our website!
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 Zipline
Zipline is the world’s largest autonomous delivery system, built to provide fast, reliable access to medicine, food, and other essential goods. We design, build, and operate high-performance logistics systems that serve customers across healthcare, retail, and government on four continents.
Our Manufacturing Engineering team builds the production systems that turn complex designs into reliable, scalable hardware. We are looking for engineers who like solving practical problems, moving quickly, and building equipment that works in the real world.
About You And The Role
We are looking for a Lead Production Equipment & Tooling Design Engineer to design the fixtures, workstations, assembly tooling, and production equipment used to build Zipline products at scale.
This role is focused on hardware for the factory floor, with a mix of technical ownership and people leadership. You will lead a small group of equipment and tooling design engineers while remaining deeply hands-on in the work. This role is expected to be approximately 75% individual contributor and 25% leadership, with responsibility for both delivering critical tooling and equipment projects yourself and helping guide the team’s priorities, quality, and execution.
You will work closely with Manufacturing Engineering, Design Engineering, Quality, and Technicians to create tools and equipment that make assembly safer, faster, more repeatable, and easier to maintain. Typical projects may include alignment fixtures, press and torque tooling, ergonomic workstations, poka-yoke devices, handling tools, and end-of-line test equipment for electro-mechanical assemblies.
You will own projects from concept through production release: defining requirements, building CAD, releasing drawings, supporting fabrication, debugging equipment on the line, and improving designs after launch. You will also help develop the team by reviewing designs, mentoring engineers, and driving strong engineering standards across tooling and production equipment development.
What You’ll Bring
- 5+ years of experience designing manufacturing equipment, tooling, or fixtures in a production environment.
- Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering or a related field.
- Strong mechanical design skills, including GD&T, tolerance stack-up, mechanism design, and material/process selection.
- Proficiency in 3D CAD; Siemens NX preferred.
- Experience designing and releasing custom tooling for repeatable assembly of electro-mechanical products.
- Hands-on experience supporting fabrication, build, debug, and commissioning of production equipment.
- Familiarity with common factory hardware such as pneumatics, sensors, actuators, linear motion, and machine guarding.
- Understanding of DFM/DFA, ergonomics, poka-yoke, and operator-centered tooling design.
- Experience working cross-functionally with design, quality, technicians, and vendors in a fast-paced environment.
- Strong judgment, ownership, and willingness to spend time on the manufacturing floor solving problems.
The starting cash range for this role is Salary range: $150,000 - $180,000.00. Please note that this is a target, starting cash range for a candidate who meets the minimum qualifications for this role. We are always open to negotiation. 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; 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, 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. If you like the sound of this position but are not sure if you are the perfect fit, please apply!
If you’d like to learn more about Zipline and our teams, feel free to check out our Instagram, one of our Reddit AMA’s, or our website!
