SlipstreamJobs tracks this role from the company's public career site. Apply directly on the employer's site.
Zipline is the world's largest autonomous drone delivery service, operating on four continents and completing millions of deliveries of blood, vaccines, medical supplies, food, and retail products. The company is entering its biggest build period in Africa, planning to open 20+ new distribution sites across Nigeria and Côte d'Ivoire over the next two years, plus launching its first Precision Delivery network in Kigali, Rwanda.
As Head of Deployments, Africa, you will own every site launch from signed contract through land acquisition, permits, construction, power infrastructure, hiring, training, and commissioning to final handover. You will lead parallel launch teams across multiple countries, establish and refine the deployment playbook to make each launch faster and more repeatable, and build a flexible organization that scales up during build waves and down when complete. You report to the Head of Operations, Africa, and work alongside regional leadership on Service Delivery and Logistics.
Key responsibilities include:
- Leading parallel launch programmes across Nigeria and Côte d'Ivoire, driving the work end-to-end and holding teams to dates and quality standards
- Running the Kigali Precision Delivery launch as a dedicated workstream with clear go/no-go gates
- Owning and productizing the deployment playbook and bill of materials to improve speed with each launch
- Planning each country as a single programme with unified customs, spares, and power strategies
- Implementing written acceptance gates for site handovers, with accountability for defects in the first 90 days
- Building and leading a core team of programme managers, operations readiness specialists, construction and electrical experts, plus in-country launch pods
- Partnering with Country Directors, governments, regulators, contractors, Supply Chain, Logistics, and Engineering to clear obstacles
Success means sites go live certified and on schedule, time-to-launch decreases with each iteration, sites are accepted first time with minimal defects, all sites deliver on or under budget, and the Kigali launch meets its gates.
Requirements:
- 12–15+ years delivering multi-site infrastructure or network build programmes (telecom tower rollouts, renewable energy, logistics hubs, data centres, fulfilment networks) at scale
- Hands-on build experience in Africa, including land acquisition, permits, customs, power, contractor management, and government interfaces; West Africa experience especially valued
- Track record running parallel builds against contractual deadlines
- Experience building and applying repeatable deployment playbooks across many sites
- Strategic mindset combined with hands-on capability to walk sites and identify issues
- Comfort leading organizations that grow and shrink with the launch pipeline
- Strong programme and project management skills; ability to drive workstreams end-to-end across teams you don't directly manage
- Excellent stakeholder management and negotiation skills; proven ability to align senior commercial leaders and maintain quality standards under delivery pressure
