Manager, Test Maintenance Operations

Test Maintenance Lead

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 the Role

As the Test Maintenance Lead, you will own test maintenance execution across Zipline's full test operations footprint, including test deployments for Truckzilla, Nest0, NestZ, Cascades, and any future test sites requiring maintenance support. You'll be responsible for the operating model, staffing coordination, execution quality, escalation paths, and maintenance readiness for test aircraft and test-site activity.

This is a broad leadership role, not a single-site lead role. You'll be accountable for ensuring test maintenance can support flight test velocity, return-to-service timelines, special configurations, engineering test campaigns, seasonal operations, and future test-site growth without relying on ad hoc support from commercial maintenance or constant senior-leader intervention.

Your leadership will directly impact aircraft availability, test velocity, technician productivity, and the team's ability to turn test-site learnings into scalable maintenance standards for future commercial operations. This role requires a hands-on leader with strong technical judgment, operational discipline, people leadership, and the ability to manage execution across multiple sites and shifting priorities.

What You'll Do

• Own test maintenance execution across Truckzilla, Nest0, NestZ, Cascades, and future test sites
• Build and maintain the test maintenance operating model, including coverage expectations, escalation paths, handoffs, prioritization, technician allocation, and site support structure
• Lead Test Maintenance Technicians, Assistant Leads, local/site maintenance support, and other assigned resources through daily priorities, execution standards, quality expectations, and escalation discipline
• Manage test aircraft return-to-service flow across all test operations, including blockers, parts constraints, inspection status, modification work, troubleshooting, and readiness for upcoming test events
• Serve as the primary maintenance execution owner for Flight Test, Engineering, site leadership, and MOE leadership when aircraft availability or maintenance readiness is at risk
• Coordinate maintenance support for special test configurations, life leaders, high-priority aircraft, Truckzilla operations, Cascades seasonal activity, and future test campaigns
• Maintain clear visibility into test maintenance backlog, aircraft status, return-to-service blockers, technician capacity, and upcoming demand across sites
• Partner with the Test Maintenance Program Manager to connect daily execution needs with program-level planning, cross-functional dependencies, staffing needs, and future site readiness
• Ensure test maintenance learnings are captured and translated into maintainability improvements, tooling needs, process changes, standard work, training, and commercial handoff criteria
• Develop the next layer of test maintenance leadership by identifying high-potential technicians or assistant leads and giving them structured ownership of sites, fleets, or operating lanes
• Align staffing plans with shifting test priorities, seasonal coverage needs, and future test-site growth
• Enforce shop floor standards, safety protocols, documentation discipline, and execution accountability across test maintenance environments

What You'll Bring

• 5+ years of experience in aviation maintenance, fleet operations, test operations, or related technical field leadership
• Proven track record leading maintenance teams in fast-paced, high-ambiguity operational environments
• Experience managing maintenance execution across multiple sites, fleets, shifts, or operating lanes
• Strong knowledge of aircraft maintenance standards, safety expectations, documentation discipline, and audit readiness
• Demonstrated ability to manage return-to-service pipelines, backlog, inspections, modification work, and aircraft readiness
• Strong people leadership skills with a focus on coaching, technician development, accountability, and building the next layer of leadership
• Operational discipline with the ability to manage KPIs, implement SOPs, enforce standards, and improve execution quality
• Ability to coordinate across Flight Test, Engineering, site operations, program management, and senior leadership
• Strong communication and escalation judgment, especially when aircraft availability, test velocity, or site readiness is at risk
• Flexibility to support shifting test priorities, seasonal operations, site growth, and a scaling maintenance environment

Success Metrics

• Aircraft downtime across Truckzilla, Nest0, NestZ, Cascades, life leaders, and special test configurations
• Return-to-service times and backlog closure across active test aircraft
• Test-site uptime, turnaround performance, and maintenance readiness
• Technician productivity, error rate, training progression, and staffing coverage
• Shift effectiveness, escalation quality, and handoff discipline
• Compliance with SOPs, documentation expectations, configuration tracking, and audit readiness
• Successful support of test campaigns, special configurations, seasonal operations, and future test-site launches
• Clear capture and handoff of test maintenance learnings into tooling, process, training, standard work, and commercial readiness improvements

What Else You Need to Know

The salary range for this position is $115,000 - $130,000. Zipline is an equal opportunity employer and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, ancestry, national origin, religion or religious creed, mental or physical disability, medical condition, genetic information, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, and related medical conditions), sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, age, marital status, military or veteran status, citizenship, or other characteristics protected by state, federal or local law or our other policies. 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!