Authorities provide differing definitions of the middle-market or mid-market

companies A company, abbreviated as co., is a legal entity representing an association of people, whether natural, legal or a mixture of both, with a specific objective. Company members share a common purpose and unite to achieve specific, declared go ...

. While some authorities look to

revenue In accounting, revenue is the total amount of income generated by the sale of goods and services related to the primary operations of the business. Commercial revenue may also be referred to as sales or as turnover. Some companies receive reven ...

generated by companies to define the middle market, other sources regard either asset size or number of employees as a better metric for comparing company sizes. Definitions of the middle market are generally derived by dividing the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

economy An economy is an area of the production, distribution and trade, as well as consumption of goods and services. In general, it is defined as a social domain that emphasize the practices, discourses, and material expressions associated with the ...

into three categories:

small business Small businesses are types of corporations, partnerships, or sole proprietorships which have fewer employees and/or less annual revenue than a regular-sized business or corporation. Businesses are defined as "small" in terms of being able to ap ...

, middle-market, and

big business Big business involves large-scale corporate-controlled financial or business activities. As a term, it describes activities that run from "huge transactions" to the more general "doing big things". In corporate jargon, the concept is commonly kn ...

. According to figures collected by the U.S.

Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau (USCB), officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the U.S. Federal Statistical System, responsible for producing data about the American people and economy. The Census Bureau is part of the ...

, the total revenue of all U.S. businesses in 2012 was roughly $32.6 trillion. The largest of these companies, which are big businesses with revenue of over $3 billion, make up roughly one-third of that total, and businesses with a revenue of under $100 million made up about another third of the total revenue. The middle market can thus be defined as the companies larger than small businesses but smaller than big businesses that account for the middle third of the U.S. economy's revenue. Other authorities define middle-market firms differently. The

National Center for the Middle Market The National Center for the Middle Market (NCMM) is a research center located at The Ohio State University Fisher College of Business. The center conducts research about and for middle market companies. The center focuses its efforts on research ...

at the Ohio State University Fisher College of Business as well as

Dun & Bradstreet The Dun & Bradstreet Corporation is an American company that provides commercial data, analytics, and insights for businesses. Headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida, the company offers a wide range of products and services for risk and financia ...

’s proprietary database of commercially-active U.S. firms define middle market businesses as those companies with revenues between $10 million and $1 billion per year. The definition is defined in reference to small businesses, which earn less than $10 million in annual revenue, and big business, which earn at least $1 billion in revenues and are generally the smallest eligible for a credit rating by one of the "major" credit-rating agencies. Investopedia considers middle market firms to be those with sizable annual revenues, ranging from $50 million to $1 billion, which straddle the market between smaller companies and billion-dollar giants.

In the United States

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 Gross domestic product (GDP) is a monetary measure of the market value of all the final goods and services produced and sold (not resold) in a specific time period by countries. Due to its complex and subjective nature this measure is ofte ...

would rank it as the fourth-largest economy in the world.

In Europe

Mid-market companies—companies that are too big to be considered

SMEs Superconducting magnetic energy storage (SMES) systems store energy in the magnetic field created by the flow of direct current in a Superconductivity, superconducting coil which has been Cryogenics, cryogenically cooled to a temperature below ...

, 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 The École Supérieure des Sciences Economiques et Commerciales (more commonly ESSEC Business School or ESSEC) is a major French business and management school, with non-profit association status (French association law of 1901) founded in 1907 ...

and

GE Capital GE Capital is the financial services division of General Electric. The company currently only runs one division, GE Energy Financial Services. It had provided additional services in the past; however, those units were sold between 2013 and 2018 ...

, 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 latter 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 The Association for Corporate Growth (ACG) is an organization providing a global "community" for mergers and acquisitions and corporate growth professionals. Founded in 1954, ACG has grown to more than 14,500 members from corporations, private e ...

(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.Middle Market Growth
International alliances such as

Alliott Group Alliott Global Alliance is an alliance of independent professional services firms including accounting firms, law firms, audit firms and other specialist services providers. The association was established in 1979 and comprises 194 member firms in ...

bring together independent local practices that offer professional services (accounting, tax and legal) to middle market companies targeting growth through expansion to the international marketplace.

Investment banks

References

External links