Full Name
Cyrus Sigari
Job Title
Co-Founder and Managing Partner
Company
UP.Partners
Speaker Bio
Aviator, entrepreneur, and investor, Cyrus Sigari, is recognized as one of the world’s foremost experts on the future of flight. Sigari is a sought-after advisor and partner to heads of state, U.S. governors, corporate executives, military leaders, and investors worldwide.
Sigari is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of UP.Partners is a multi-strategy venture capital firm investing in dual-use commercial and defense technologies that move people and goods—cleaner, faster, safer, and at lower cost—across ground, air, sea, and space. The firm’s partners and investors include notable multinational corporations such as Alaska Airlines, Honeywell, Porsche, Toyota, JB Hunt, Airbus, Bell Flight, Google, Tesla, SpaceX, and Walmart. UP.Partners’ portfolio of investments can be found here.
To support his work at UP.Partners, and in partnership with Tom & Steuart Walton and Ross Perot Jr., Sigari spearheaded the creation of the UP.Summit. Known as the “Davos of Mobility”, the event has become the definitive gathering for leaders in transportation, drawing the world’s top entrepreneurs, investors, corporate executives, policymakers, and military leaders who are collectively transforming the moving world. Videos of the 2024 event can be found here and here. Alongside the UP.Summit, Sigari set a Guinness World Record for the largest model rocket lesson in history with 19,000 kids building and launching 6,500 model rockets at the UP.Summit Community Day, attracting over 12,000 in-person attendees.
Sigari serves on the board of directors for Game Composites, a Bentonville-based manufacturer of high-performance aerobatic and firefighting aircraft, as well as for Pivotal, a Palo Alto-based company specializing in electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft.
In 2022, Sigari was appointed Chairman of the Arkansas Council on Future Mobility by Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson. In this role, Sigari was tasked with leading the statewide strategy to prepare Arkansas for the rapidly evolving mobility landscape. The strategy Sigari developed has since influenced policies in numerous states across the U.S. The strategy can be found here.
Sigari’s work spans the globe as a partner to the Prime Minister’s Office of the United Arab Emirates, leading the country’s mobility round table in association with the World Government Summit held in Dubai each year.
Part and parcel to supporting UP.Partners thought leadership initiatives, Sigari is the principal author of the firm’s flagship annual research project, The Moving World Report - a year-long research project pulling together hundreds of research sources around all things mobility. Sigari’s interview on Bloomberg related to the report can be found here.
Sigari is also a prominent figure in business aviation. As Executive Chairman and co-founder of jetAVIVA, Sigari helped grow the company into one of the world’s largest business aircraft sellers, with annual sales exceeding $500 million.
Prior to co-founding jetAVIVA and UP.Partners, Sigari served as a propulsion systems engineer, flight test engineer, and test pilot. Sigari was credited for leading the design, test, and FAA certification on the first non-halon fire suppression system for aviation in over 50 years with the development of PhostrEx. The breakthrough resulted in the receipt of the 2007 Stratospheric Ozone Protection Award from the EPA.
With over 30 years of experience flying airplanes and helicopters, Sigari has accumulated thousands of hours of flight time and personally operates a Bell 505 helicopter and Embraer Phenom 300. He is an instructor pilot certified on 13 different jets, including the Boeing 747. A graduate of Purdue University’s Aerospace and Aeronautical Engineering program, Sigari was named the 2023 Outstanding Aerospace Engineer of the Year by his alma mater. In 2022, he received the Inspiration Award from Angel Flight for his support of humanitarian aviation service organizations.
Sigari’s current philanthropic efforts are mostly focused toward supporting The Station Foundation, a Bozeman, MT based organization supporting special operations war fighters re-integrating into civilian society, and Soaring Spirits International, a Los Angeles-based organization supporting widowed people.
An Ironman triathlete and self-described adventure enthusiast, Sigari’s passion for exploration and innovation continues to fuel his impact on the future of mobility and helping humanity go UP.
Sigari is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of UP.Partners is a multi-strategy venture capital firm investing in dual-use commercial and defense technologies that move people and goods—cleaner, faster, safer, and at lower cost—across ground, air, sea, and space. The firm’s partners and investors include notable multinational corporations such as Alaska Airlines, Honeywell, Porsche, Toyota, JB Hunt, Airbus, Bell Flight, Google, Tesla, SpaceX, and Walmart. UP.Partners’ portfolio of investments can be found here.
To support his work at UP.Partners, and in partnership with Tom & Steuart Walton and Ross Perot Jr., Sigari spearheaded the creation of the UP.Summit. Known as the “Davos of Mobility”, the event has become the definitive gathering for leaders in transportation, drawing the world’s top entrepreneurs, investors, corporate executives, policymakers, and military leaders who are collectively transforming the moving world. Videos of the 2024 event can be found here and here. Alongside the UP.Summit, Sigari set a Guinness World Record for the largest model rocket lesson in history with 19,000 kids building and launching 6,500 model rockets at the UP.Summit Community Day, attracting over 12,000 in-person attendees.
Sigari serves on the board of directors for Game Composites, a Bentonville-based manufacturer of high-performance aerobatic and firefighting aircraft, as well as for Pivotal, a Palo Alto-based company specializing in electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft.
In 2022, Sigari was appointed Chairman of the Arkansas Council on Future Mobility by Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson. In this role, Sigari was tasked with leading the statewide strategy to prepare Arkansas for the rapidly evolving mobility landscape. The strategy Sigari developed has since influenced policies in numerous states across the U.S. The strategy can be found here.
Sigari’s work spans the globe as a partner to the Prime Minister’s Office of the United Arab Emirates, leading the country’s mobility round table in association with the World Government Summit held in Dubai each year.
Part and parcel to supporting UP.Partners thought leadership initiatives, Sigari is the principal author of the firm’s flagship annual research project, The Moving World Report - a year-long research project pulling together hundreds of research sources around all things mobility. Sigari’s interview on Bloomberg related to the report can be found here.
Sigari is also a prominent figure in business aviation. As Executive Chairman and co-founder of jetAVIVA, Sigari helped grow the company into one of the world’s largest business aircraft sellers, with annual sales exceeding $500 million.
Prior to co-founding jetAVIVA and UP.Partners, Sigari served as a propulsion systems engineer, flight test engineer, and test pilot. Sigari was credited for leading the design, test, and FAA certification on the first non-halon fire suppression system for aviation in over 50 years with the development of PhostrEx. The breakthrough resulted in the receipt of the 2007 Stratospheric Ozone Protection Award from the EPA.
With over 30 years of experience flying airplanes and helicopters, Sigari has accumulated thousands of hours of flight time and personally operates a Bell 505 helicopter and Embraer Phenom 300. He is an instructor pilot certified on 13 different jets, including the Boeing 747. A graduate of Purdue University’s Aerospace and Aeronautical Engineering program, Sigari was named the 2023 Outstanding Aerospace Engineer of the Year by his alma mater. In 2022, he received the Inspiration Award from Angel Flight for his support of humanitarian aviation service organizations.
Sigari’s current philanthropic efforts are mostly focused toward supporting The Station Foundation, a Bozeman, MT based organization supporting special operations war fighters re-integrating into civilian society, and Soaring Spirits International, a Los Angeles-based organization supporting widowed people.
An Ironman triathlete and self-described adventure enthusiast, Sigari’s passion for exploration and innovation continues to fuel his impact on the future of mobility and helping humanity go UP.
