OVERVIEW
This special report on the US middle market is intended to highlight the many new frontiers to which GPs are boldly setting forth.

• Globalisation – in this special report we examine several buyout firms that have established offices in China, following the lead of much larger corporations.
• Specialisation – as Rob Kotecki writes buyout firms have a major reason to narrow their sector focuses in the form of deal sourcing. Firms that know a very defined terrain tend to see and win deals with greater frequency than do generalists.
• Intermediation – the dynamics of the auction are now a permanent feature of the middle market. But when buyout firms are sellers, auctions work to their advantage.
• Proliferation – more than 150 US middle-market buyout funds that are either in the market raising capital or are expected to come to market within the next 12 months. This proliferation is born of investor demand and also of founding partners not sharing enough economics to keep talented deal partners from defecting.

Not all of these groups will succeed in raising capital, but enough will to guarantee that the ‘ation’ isation of the US middle market continues unabated.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Market overview – Seller’s market
Profile – Blue world
The state of middle-market leveraged lending
Deal flow – Sourcing smarter
Ten worries that keep a mid-market sellside banker up at night
Globalisation – The China advantage
Fund flow – Middle-market fundraising roundup
LP interview – Europe plus