Senior/Staff Technical Program Manager - Automation & Scaling at Zoox (Foster City, CA)
Zoox· Foster City, CA· $213k–$295k·
Role details
Job description
The Program Management Office (PMO) at Zoox is responsible for driving cross-functional program planning and execution at the highest level. We partner with leaders from across the company in vehicle development, system design, software engineering, manufacturing, fleet operations, and business functions to develop and deliver major corporate milestones on the path to launch, and beyond. Our program managers contribute to the end-to-end success of technical, integrated product milestones involving both of our vehicle platforms - the Toyota Highlander test fleet and Zoox's purpose-built robotaxi.
As Zoox scales its fleet and expands into new cities, we are evolving how we develop, validate, and release software by leveraging simulation, automation, faster triage, and scalable infrastructure. Our goal is to deliver improvements to our autonomous fleet faster and more frequently, while upholding our high bar for safety and quality.
As the Technical Program Manager for Automation & Scaling, you will own the systems that make that cadence possible. That means leveraging simulation to validate at scale, scaling the cloud infrastructure behind it, and automating the triage and metrics pipelines that shorten review cycles. This is a hands-on builder role. We are looking for a technically deep program leader who has built and deployed automation that measurably cut cycle time, and who can turn promising research and prototypes across Zoox into operational, production-grade systems.
In this role, you will:
- Leverage simulation at scale: Partner with Simulation, Autonomy, and Mission Assurance teams to make simulation the primary engine for validation, expanding coverage and reducing reliance on on-road testing.
- Drive automation: Identify manual, repetitive steps across development, validation, and release, and lead the design and deployment of automation that removes them, prioritizing the work that most reduces cycle time.
- Enable faster triage: Deploy AI-assisted systems that parse logs, classify failures, and route issues, significantly reducing the time from test results to actionable fixes.
- Build scalable infrastructure: Scale cloud-based (AWS) simulation, metrics, data processing, and release evaluation pipelines so they grow with volume and support a faster, more frequent release cadence.
- Operationalize what already exists: Work alongside Zoox's technical experts and research teams, apply a programmatic lens, and turn prototypes into production systems that teams depend on.
- Drive and measure impact: Instrument the process end to end, find the bottlenecks, and report progress against cycle-time goals in clear, data-backed narratives for executive leadership
Qualifications:
- Bachelor's or Master's degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a related technical field, or equivalent experience.
- 8+ years of experience in software engineering, technical program management, or a combination, with a strong software background.
- A track record of designing and deploying automation that measurably reduced cycle time, such as CI/CD, test, data, or triage pipelines.
- Hands-on familiarity with AWS and large-scale distributed compute and data systems, including simulation workloads.
- Experience building or applying AI/ML-based tools to analyze logs, detect failures, or automate engineering workflows.
- Proven ability to take research or prototype work into production, and to influence technical experts without formal authority.
- Excellent written and verbal communication, including turning technical bottlenecks into clear decisions for leadership.
Bonus Qualifications:
- Deep experience leveraging simulation platforms, virtual validation strategies, or synthetic data in autonomous vehicles or robotics.
- Experience moving a large engineering organization from infrequent releases to a release train or continuous delivery model.
- Experience with release qualification, verification and validation, or safety-critical software.
- Hands-on coding experience in Python or similar, building internal tools and automation.
About Zoox
Zoox is developing the first ground-up, fully autonomous vehicle fleet and the supporting ecosystem required to bring this technology to market. Sitting at the intersection of robotics, machine learning, and design, Zoox aims to provide the next generation of mobility-as-a-service in urban environments. We’re looking for top talent that shares our passion and wants to be part of a fast-moving and highly execution-oriented team.
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Accommodations If you need an accommodation to participate in the application or interview process please reach out to accommodations@zoox.com or your assigned recruiter.
A Final Note: You do not need to match every listed expectation to apply for this position. Here at Zoox, we know that diverse perspectives foster the innovation we need to be successful, and we are committed to building a team that encompasses a variety of backgrounds, experiences, and skills.
Why work at Zoox
- Culture: Diverse, supportive community with inclusion‑focused strategy. Crew‑led groups for personal and professional development. Emphasis on trust, humility, and openness zoox.com/careers
- Work environment: Hybrid? The careers page lists many roles as “On‑site” in Foster City, CA, with other office locations available. In‑office perks include a famous food program with daily changing local and sustainable dishes, plus a busy calendar of events and sports teams.
- Benefits: Comprehensive health plans (Cigna), mental health support, wellbeing program, flexible time off, generous family planning and caregiver support, and a commitment to work‑life balance.
- Growth opportunities: Work on cutting‑edge autonomous vehicle technology alongside some of the brightest minds in AI, engineering, computer vision, and more. Offers internships and re‑entry programs (via Path Forward) for career returners.
- Recruitment process: Uses AI tools to assist in reviewing applications but final decisions are human. No fees are charged at any stage – watch for recruitment scams zoox.com/journal/landing-a-job-zoox