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Flybridge

Flybridge is a Boston/New York-based seed VC founded 2002 by Jeff Bussgang and David Aronoff, with ~$900M AUM across seven funds. Fund VI $175M (2022 vintage).

Stage Pre-Seed → Seed
Ticket $100k - $3.0M
Quantum focus Quantum Communications
Geography United States

Investment thesis

Flybridge is a Boston/New York-based seed VC founded 2002 by Jeff Bussgang and David Aronoff, with ~$900M AUM across seven funds. Fund VI $175M (2022 vintage). Invests pre-seed to Series A across enterprise SaaS, consumer, fintech, frontier tech. Cheques $500k-$3M, lead or co-lead.

Quantum bet: Aliro Quantum (Harvard / Prineha Narang's NarangLab spin-out, quantum networking; Flybridge co-led the 2019 seed round alongside Crosslink and Samsung NEXT's Q Fund). Aliro is now the leading entanglement-based quantum networking platform (Cisco, Accenture Ventures).

Value-add: Boston-area academic networks (Harvard, MIT); enterprise SaaS GTM experience relevant to Aliro's telco and enterprise networking pivot.

Not a quantum specialist — single early bet driven by founder-market fit with Narang's Harvard origins rather than a systematic quantum thesis.

Anti-thesis

The patterns that trigger a fast no with this fund.

  1. Flybridge's seed-stage generalist model with $200M fund size lacks the reserve capacity for quantum's capital-intensive follow-on rounds, ownership erodes by Series B
  2. Jeff Bussgang has publicly emphasized AI-native applications and Class of 25 founder programs, quantum doesn't fit the rapid-iteration, low-capex profile Flybridge optimizes for
  3. Boston quantum talent (MIT, Harvard, QuEra) is well-served by strategics (IBM, Google) and specialist funds (Quantonation, Engine), Flybridge has no differentiated sourcing edge
  4. Generalist funds historically underperform specialists in deep tech because diligence requires PhD-level domain assessment Flybridge doesn't staff
  5. Limited public quantum exposure suggests opportunistic LP-driven bets rather than thesis conviction, these positions rarely attract pro-rata follow-on commitment

Notable quantum portfolio

Full portfolio →
Aliro Technologies

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