Middle-market company

In commerce, middle-market companies or mid-market companies are generally those companies with revenues between US$ $10 million and $1 billion per year according to the most authoritative references including the Economist and the National Center for the Middle Market at the Ohio State University Fisher College of Business, while other definitions exist. At the uppermost end of the middle market, those companies with $1 billion in revenues are generally the smallest eligible for a credit rating by one of the "major" credit-rating agencies.

Due to the difference in asset turns in different industries some regard either asset size or number of employees as a better metric for comparing company sizes.

The middle market is also segmented into three size categories: - Lower Middle Market - $10 - $50 million of revenue; - Middle Market - $50 - $500 million of revenue; and - Upper Middle Market - $500 - $1 billion of revenue.

In the United States of America

The 200,000 plus US-based mid-market companies are essential to America’s economic success. They account for $10 trillion annually of the $30 trillion U.S. private sector gross receipts and 30 million jobs. If the U.S. middle market were a country, its GDP would rank it as the fourth-largest economy in the world. While there are good sources of information about CEOs of large companies and small businesses; there is relatively little information about mid-size companies and their CEOs. As a consequence their issues and needs are underrepresented in policy and economic discussions.

In Europe

Mid-market companies—companies that are too big to be considered SMEs, but smaller than big, exchange listed businesses—play a key role in the UK and in the other top European economies.

According to an in depth report by ESSEC Business School and GE Capital, across the UK, Germany, France and Italy (the EU-4), the mid-market represents a relatively small number of companies (ranging from a low of 1.2% in Germany to 1.7% in France) and yet it generates about one third of private sector revenue and employs about a third of each country’s workforce. Combined, the middle market in the four European countries contributes €1.11 trillion ($1.48 trillion) to the EU-4 GDP. This makes the middle market in the EU-4 one of the top 10 economies in the world, ahead of India and Russia.

In the study, Professor Ashwin Malshe of ESSEC defined the middle market differently for each country. For example, Italy has 3.7 million firms with revenue of less than€5 million, while Germany has only 1.7 million companies this size this means that applying a single European or global definition of a mid-market firm is difficult. In the UK, mid-market firms are those with between £15m and £800m of annual revenues.

The average UK middle market firm has revenue of £78 million (€98 million) and employs 500 people, similar in size to its German counterparts but larger than the typical mid-market firm in France or Italy.

Middle-Market Organizations

Entities have evolved to serve businesses in the middle market, including for-profit and institutions of higher learning. In the later category, the Graziadio School of Private Capital Markets at Pepperdine University produces quarterly and annual data on the middle market via their Private Capital Markets Project. Other entities include the Association for Corporate Growth (ACG), which provides a global community for mergers, acquisitions, and corporate growth professionals. ACG's stated objective is to drive middle-market growth. ACG publishes Middle Market Growth online.

See also

• Free float
• List of finance topics
• List of corporations by market capitalization
• Market capitalization

External links

• Mid-Market Companies Predict Revenue, Hiring And Capital Spending Will Rise Next Year As Economy Improves: KPMG Survey
• Deloitte says mid-market companies are using new technology to great advantage