Facebook ‘Shock’ Has Boston Firms Searching for Next Zuckerberg

Mark Zuckerberg was the big one that got away.

Boston venture capitalists declined to fund the founder of Facebook, the world’s most-popular social networking service, when he sought money to expand his startup in 2004. Zuckerberg’s move that year to Palo Alto, California, from his Harvard University dorm was a wakeup call for New England firms, which have lost market share to Silicon Valley and New York in the past seven years, says Michael Greeley, a general partner at Flybridge Capital Partners.