Base‐Free Pd‐Catalyzed C−Cl Borylation of Fluorinated Aryl Chlorides

Catalytic C−X borylation of aryl halides containing two ortho‐fluorines has been found to be challenging, as most previous methods require stoichiometric amounts of base and the polyfluorinated aryl boronates suffer from protodeboronation, which is accelerated by ortho‐fluorine substituents. Herein, we report that a combination of Pd(dba)(2) (dba=dibenzylideneacetone) with SPhos (2‐dicyclohexylphosphino‐2’,6’‐dimethoxybiphenyl) as a ligand is efficient to catalyze the C‐Cl borylation of aryl chlorides containing two ortho‐fluorine substituents. This method, conducted under base‐free conditions, is compatible with the resulting di‐ortho‐fluorinated aryl boronate products which are sensitive to base.