Head of Material Planning

About Zipline

Do you want to change the world? Zipline is on a mission to transform the way goods move. Our aim is to solve the world’s most urgent and complex access challenges by building, manufacturing and operating the first instant delivery and logistics system that serves all humans equally, wherever they are. From powering Rwanda’s national blood delivery network and Ghana’s COVID-19 vaccine distribution, to providing on-demand home delivery for Walmart, to enabling healthcare providers to bring care directly to U.S. homes, we are transforming the way things move for businesses, governments and consumers.   The technology is complex but the idea is simple: a teleportation service that delivers what you need, when you need it. Through our technology that includes robotics and autonomy, we are decarbonizing delivery, decreasing road congestion, and reducing fossil fuel consumption and air pollution, while providing equitable access to billions of people and building a more resilient global supply chain.   Join Zipline and help us to make good on our promise to build an equitable and more resilient global supply chain for billions of people.

About You and The Role  

The Head of Material Planning gives Zipline the ability to build what we need when we need it by exercising end to end control over an integrated planning cycle including Demand Planning, Production Planning, Supply Planning, Purchasing, Project Launch and Change Management. In this role, you will work with Global Logistics, Business Development, Manufacturing, Supply Chain, and Engineering teams, and in doing so directly impact our ability to scale our life-saving service from tens of millions to hundreds of millions of people.

What You'll Do  

• Lead Demand Planning for production and service demand: Using a global demand forecast, create / monitor / update a global demand plan to support new production and service demand.
• Lead Production Planning: Create / monitor / update production schedules that reconcile demand plans with internal / external manufacturing capacity. 
• Lead Supply Planning: Define, monitor, update and optimize quantities of input parts / procured finished subassemblies to support production plans while protecting against demand and lead time variability.
• Lead Purchasing: Define, implement, operate and maintain and improve the Purchase Order cycle. Create appropriate checks and balances in the Purchase Order cycle with the overall goal that spend must be validated based on approval of part / vendor combinations, production state and level of spend.
• Lead Change Management: Control the approval of hardware-related changes and monitor the implementation of approved changes.
• Define and evolve Zipline’s inventory strategy by determining and monitoring the correct quantities of finished assemblies and input materials required to be held at various points in the distribution network to support both manufacturing operations and flight operations.
• Lead improvement activities to decrease occurrence of stockouts, reduce excess/obsolete inventory, optimize inventory positions and model in field consumption rates.
• Scale the Team: Design and staff the Material Planning organization to effectively support operations in current and projected markets.

What You'll Bring 

• A minimum of 7 years experience in Supply Chain or Manufacturing operations: Material Planning, Strategic Sourcing, Production Control or Distribution Network optimization.
• A minimum of 5 years leadership in Supply Chain or Manufacturing operations.
• A broad technical background with the ability to work with Engineering, Manufacturing, Quality, Procurement, Program Management  and Logistics teams.
• Proficient with analysis of large data sets: Able to extract actionable trends and craft action plans from inputs from a global network of operations sites.
• Proficient in advanced MS Excel features: Queries, Power Pivots.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, comfortable communicating with Senior and Executive Management.

What Else You Need to Know   

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