Amy Burr, CEO at JetBlue Ventures, is one of the 100 leading corporate venturing professionals in our 2025 Powerlist.
Amy Burr leads JetBlue Ventures (JBV), an early-stage venture capital firm focused on companies redefining the travel and transportation landscape, with an emphasis on enterprise and frontier technologies.
Originally founded as JetBlue’s corporate VC arm, JBV is now part of SKY Leasing, a premier aviation asset manager, and has a strategic partnership with JetBlue. Founded in 2016, the firm focuses on investments that advance the travel and transportation industries. The team of nine manages an active portfolio of 44 companies, with 57 overall investments and eight exits.
The unit is divided into an investment team and an operations team, whose two-fold mission centres around innovation and business development. The teams are closely integrated and are tasked with supporting portfolio companies after investment. This makeup echoes Burr’s management style, centred around collaboration. “Every member of my team has a say in what we are doing for strategy and how we accomplish things,” says Burr. At annual strategy offsites, the team discusses goals not just as a venture firm, but as part of JetBlue and the industry overall.
Burr’s key remit is to facilitate the integration of successful startup programmes into the airline’s overall corporate innovation strategy. A prime example of success is Tomorrow.io, a weather-intelligence platform. Initially introduced via an innovation sprint, JetBlue Ventures invested in 2017 and piloted a proof of concept.
“How we introduce our startups to others is one of the things that makes us who we are.”
The company has since expanded to series E funding and has been integrated into the JetBlue network for the past several years. Here, too, collaboration has been a focus. Tomorrow.io has benefitted from JetBlue’s network and industry reach. “How we introduce our startups to others is one of the things that makes us who we are,” says Burr.
AI continues to trend as an investment priority, with a focus on operational efficiency. In 2024, the fund invested in Wherobots, a spatial analytics firm that allows companies to better use data to game out operational scenarios.
Burr began her career in the airline industry at Continental, before joining Virgin America as one of the founders in 2004, and was at the forefront of its integration with Alaskan Airlines.
The Global Corporate Venturing Powerlist represents the 100 individuals spearheading the future of the corporate venturing industry.
These individuals excel in terms of their venturing approach and structure, number and quality of portfolio companies and in their contributions to the corporate venturing profession.
