Z
Zipline
Senior/Staff Electrical Engineer (Dropbox)
Skills
SQL QueriesPythonMATLABSupply Chain
2 months ago
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Important information
Contract type:
Permanent
Salary:
$145,000 – $225,000 / year
Location:
San Francisco, CA, USA
Work mode:
Onsite
Published on:
29 August 2026
What they need
- As a Senior or Staff Electrical Engineer on Dropbox, you will own critical electrical systems from architecture and component selection through detailed design, validation, production ramp, and fleet operation
- Your scope will include power distribution, motor and actuator interfaces, sensing, PCBAs, wiring harnesses, connectors, grounding, protection, communications, and system diagnostics
- Dropbox operates unattended in demanding field environments and around untrained users
- Its electrical systems must tolerate weather, installation variation, power disturbances, mechanical motion, contamination, service activity, and repeated daily operation while remaining safe and easy to diagnose
- You will work closely with Mechanical Engineering, Firmware, Systems, Safety, Test, Reliability, Manufacturing, Supply Chain, Deployment, and Operations
- This is a hands-on individual-contributor role with responsibility for both detailed electrical design and system-level product outcomes
- At the Staff level, you will additionally set the electrical architecture and technical direction across Dropbox generations, establish reusable design standards, and lead resolution of the program’s most complex cross-functional problems
- Own critical Dropbox electrical systems from requirements and architecture through production release and field deployment
- Develop electrical architecture for power distribution, control electronics, sensors, actuators, user interfaces, communications, and service diagnostics
- Translate product behavior, safety analyses, environmental conditions, mechanical interfaces, and field workflows into electrical requirements
- Define electrical success metrics such as power consumption, sensing coverage, fault-detection performance, environmental margin, production yield, and field reliability
- Select and integrate sensors, motors, actuators, motor drivers, power supplies, converters, protection devices, connectors, harnesses, and communications interfaces
- Design or guide the development of PCBAs, schematics, layouts, cables, wiring harnesses, interconnects, and electrical assembly documentation
- Own power budgets, grounding and shielding strategy, connector architecture, current-carrying margins, thermal derating, and protection coordination
- Design for electrical faults including overcurrent, short circuit, reverse polarity, overvoltage, undervoltage, brownouts, electrostatic discharge, connection errors, and loss of communication
- Partner with Safety and Systems engineers to ensure electrical hazards are controlled through architecture, isolation, protection, sensing, and fault response
- Work closely with Mechanical Engineering on electronics packaging, cable routing, connector access, environmental sealing, thermal management, strain relief, and serviceability
- Partner with Firmware engineers to define sensor behavior, actuator interfaces, motor control, state transitions, interlocks, fault detection, telemetry, and recovery
- Ensure electrical interfaces and configuration are unambiguous across product variants, site installations, and manufacturing builds
- Perform circuit analysis, power analysis, signal-integrity assessment, tolerance analysis, derating, and worst-case analysis
- Build prototypes, instrument systems, perform bench testing, and use data to retire technical risk
- Develop validation plans covering functional performance, power quality, electrical safety, environmental exposure, ingress, thermal cycling, vibration, ESD, EMI/EMC, cable flexing, connector life, and fault injection
- Lead design reviews, DFMEAs, hazard reviews, and electrical readiness reviews
- Produce complete schematics, drawings, specifications, interface-control documents, BOMs, test requirements, and release documentation
- Work directly with suppliers to qualify components, PCBAs, harnesses, connectors, power systems, and manufacturing processes
- Partner with NPI, Manufacturing, and Quality to develop scalable assembly, inspection, programming, calibration, and end-of-line test processes
- Support prototype builds, engineering validation, design validation, production validation, and manufacturing ramp
- Lead investigations of test, production, and field failures using telemetry, logs, electrical measurements, physical inspection, and structured root-cause methods
- Drive issues from containment through corrective action and verify that fixes measurably reduce recurrence
- Use fleet data and service records to improve electrical reliability, fault detection, diagnostics, and maintenance procedures
- Mentor engineers and establish electrical design, documentation, review, and release best practices
- At the Staff level, identify systemic technical risks, drive cross-generational architecture decisions, and align electrical, mechanical, firmware, test, and manufacturing strategies
- —-What success looks like—-
- Dropbox electrical systems meet safety, reliability, power, environmental, and production requirements
- Electrical releases reach production with strong yield and without recurring integration issues
- Sensors, actuators, interlocks, and fault responses behave predictably across supported product configurations
- Field electrical failures are detected quickly, diagnosed from useful telemetry, and permanently corrected
- Manufacturing and Deployment teams can build, install, commission, and service Dropbox without repeated engineering intervention
- Electrical architecture supports future Dropbox capabilities without unnecessary redesign or product variants- Strong systems judgment and the ability to recognize when an electrical symptom originates in mechanical hardware, firmware, configuration, or field conditions
- Location and logistics: this role is in person in South San Francisco and includes some travel to suppliers, manufacturers, test locations, and deployment sites as needed
- Experience debugging intermittent problems involving power, signal integrity, connectors, sensors, communications, or firmware interaction
- Knowledge of environmental protection, thermal derating, ESD, EMI/EMC, ingress, corrosion, vibration, and connector reliability
- Experience designing electronics for systems containing motors, actuators, sensors, PCBAs, harnesses, connectors, and embedded controls
- Experience designing for outdoor, industrial, automotive, aerospace, robotics, appliance, or similarly demanding environments
- Hands-on proficiency with oscilloscopes, multimeters, power analyzers, electronic loads, logic analyzers, current probes, and data-acquisition equipment
- Experience defining verification plans, fault-injection tests, and production acceptance criteria
- Proven end-to-end ownership of complex electrical or electromechanical products through architecture, validation, production ramp, and field deployment
- Traits: strong technical judgment, hands-on curiosity, disciplined documentation, comfort with ambiguity, and persistence until difficult failures are understood
- Clear written, verbal, and visual communication, including concise documentation of architecture decisions, assumptions, interfaces, and risks
- Demonstrated ability to develop robust power-distribution, grounding, shielding, protection, and interconnect architectures
- Experience implementing DFM, DFT, end-of-line testing, calibration, and manufacturing controls
- Experience with schematic capture, PCB design reviews, component selection, tolerance analysis, and worst-case circuit analysis
- Strong electrical engineering fundamentals across analog, digital, power, sensors, motor interfaces, embedded systems, and communications
- Operating intensity: periodic off-hours support may be required during critical builds, test campaigns, production ramps, and field escalations
- Track record working directly with PCB, harness, component, and contract-manufacturing suppliers
- Ability to analyze telemetry or test data using Python, SQL, MATLAB, or equivalent tools
- Experience with motor-control electronics, position sensing, safety interlocks, or automated mechanisms
- Experience with batteries, solar power, or distributed low-voltage systems
- Experience with functional-safety principles or electronics operating around untrained users
- Experience developing remote diagnostics, fleet-health monitoring, or automated failure-detection tools
- Firmware experience in C/C++ or experience debugging embedded systems at the hardware-software boundary
- Experience with high-volume electromechanical products
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