User Experience Designer: Hardware Systems

Posted 2 Days Ago
Be an Early Applicant
South San Francisco, CA, USA
In-Office
Senior level
Aerospace • Hardware • Logistics • Robotics • Software • Transportation
Zipline democratizes access to critical medical supplies through instant drone delivery.
The Role
Designs end-to-end user experiences for Zipline’s autonomous delivery hardware, software, operations, and service touchpoints. Conducts field research, translates complex system behavior into user journeys and interaction models, defines product requirements, prototypes physical and digital concepts, and partners with engineering, industrial design, and product teams to improve clarity, safety, usability, and trust.
Summary Generated by Built In
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 

The New Products team is seeking a User Experience Designer to research and shape how people interact with Zipline’s precision delivery system, Platform 2. This cross-disciplinary role sits at the intersection of industrial design, software, operations, and service design. 

You will focus on the human experience of our hardware and the digital tools that support them. You will own the definition of design requirements for system touchpoints and champion them through all phases of development to enable the best experiences for Zipline operators and customers.

What You'll Do
  • Design end-to-end user experiences across physical and digital touchpoints, including aircraft, pods, docks, loading workflows, partner infrastructure, operator tools, and customer-facing moments.
  • Translate complex system behavior into clear interaction models, user journeys, service flows, and product requirements.
  • Partner with Engineers and Industrial Designers to define physical interactions, affordances, feedback, status communication, and error recovery.
  • Work with Digital Product teams to ensure consistency between physical systems behavior and software interfaces.
  • Conduct field research with operators, partners, customers, technicians, and internal teams to understand real-world workflows and pain points.
  • Identify design opportunities across system hardware, software, service, and operations.
  • Help prioritize user needs and translate them into product requirements.
  • Prototype and test interaction concepts quickly, using whatever fidelity is appropriate: sketches, diagrams, click-through prototypes, physical mockups, or in-field simulations.
  • Advocate for clarity, safety, usability, and human trust in autonomous delivery experiences.
What You'll Bring
  • Minimum 5+ years of experience in User Experience, Industrial Design, Service / Interaction Design, or Product Design shaping user connection to physical products, digital interfaces, and real-world workflows.
  • A strong portfolio beautifully showcasing real-world results.
  • Strong visual communication skills, including journey maps, diagrams, wireframes, storyboards, and prototypes.
  • A practical, simplicity-seeking design sensibility and an ability to prototype physically and digitally - beautifully.
  • A high degree of comfort presenting work to executive leadership and acting as the champion for product requirements and design decisions.
  • Strong systems thinking and the ability to make complex technical experiences simple and usable.
  • Design Research acumen: conducting in-person analysis of user behavior through interviews, field visits, focus groups and surveys
  • Ability to move between abstract journey-level thinking and detailed interaction design that are easily understandable by teams who will implement them.
  • Ability to work in ambiguous, fast-moving environments with evolving technical constraints.
  • Entrepreneurial mindset and a humble confidence backed by real-world understanding.
What Else You Need To Know

The starting cash range for this role is $153,000 - $210,000. 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.

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!

Voluntary Self-Identification

For government reporting purposes, we ask candidates to respond to the below self-identification survey. Completion of the form is entirely voluntary. Whatever your decision, it will not be considered in the hiring process or thereafter. Any information that you do provide will be recorded and maintained in a confidential file.

As set forth in Zipline ’s Equal Employment Opportunity policy, we do not discriminate on the basis of any protected group status under any applicable law.

Skills Required

  • 5+ years of experience in User Experience, Industrial Design, Service Design, Interaction Design, or Product Design
  • Strong portfolio demonstrating real-world design results
  • Strong visual communication skills, including journey maps, diagrams, wireframes, storyboards, and prototypes
  • Ability to prototype physically and digitally
  • Comfort presenting work to executive leadership and championing product requirements and design decisions
  • Strong systems thinking and ability to simplify complex technical experiences
  • Design research experience using interviews, field visits, focus groups, and surveys
  • Ability to work across abstract journey-level thinking and detailed interaction design
  • Ability to work in ambiguous, fast-moving environments with evolving technical constraints
  • Entrepreneurial mindset and practical real-world understanding

Zipline Compensation & Benefits Highlights

The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about Zipline and has not been reviewed or approved by Zipline.

  • Healthcare Strength — Healthcare coverage is consistently described as comprehensive and high quality, with multiple plan choices, low out‑of‑pocket costs, and additions like HRA, One Medical, and fertility support.
  • Parental & Family Support — Parental and family leave is highlighted as generous and meaningfully used, reinforcing support for major life events.
  • Leave & Time Off Breadth — Paid time off, sick days, and holidays are portrayed as solid and broadly available, contributing to overall benefits depth.

Zipline Insights

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The Company
HQ: South San Francisco, CA
375 Employees
Year Founded: 2014

What We Do

Zipline is the world's largest autonomous delivery network and is powered entirely by fixed-wing drones. Our fleet circles the equivalent distance of the equator every 2.5 days, and we have shipped hundreds of thousands of critical medical products across Rwanda, Ghana, and now beginning in the United States.

Why Work With Us

Zipline is the perfect intersection of super cutting-edge tech, deep social mission, and extremely compelling business case. Our small, scrappy, customer-obsessed, humble, and mission-driven team has set the bar for what is possible in the drone logistics industry globally, and has designed some incredibly elegant technology in the process.

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