The two precursors used to develop much of contemporary aryne reactivity are aryl halides 4 and (trimethylsilyl)aryl triflates 5 (Scheme 1b). Despite the advances in aryne reactivity made possible by these precursors, they suffer from limitations that render them unamenable to latestage functionalization. Aryl halides are widely available and found in many approved drugs, yet strong, and in some cases designer, bases and inert atmosphere are needed to generate arynes. Consequently, functional group compatibility is an issue, and electrophilic and even moderately acidic functional groups are not tolerated. 4 Moreover, the use of polyhaloarenes, which are valuable motifs, are plagued by non-regioselective deprotonation and nonchemoselective ejection of the halide leaving groups in some cases. aryl triflates represent the current state-of-the-art to generate arynes under mild conditions. 5 However, even for relatively simple substrates, several (i.e., 3-5) steps are required to synthesize these reagents and therefore they are rarely applied toward advanced intermediates. Additionally, although the arynes are generated under mild conditions, the synthesis of these aryne precursors routinely require n-BuLi and other harsh reagents that limit functional group compatibility. A shift toward minimally prefunctionalized aryne precursors would dramatically expand the use of arynes in organic synthesis. Scheme 1. Remote aryne formation.