The Small Business Investor Alliance (SBIA), an association for lower middle market private equity funds and investors, announced it has continued to achieve record growth in its membership in 2013, marking one of the fastest years of growth since the organization’s inception 55 years ago. SBIA increased its total number of member firms as 56 new firms and fund groups joined, including 12 Limited Partners.

“We are very pleased that our membership has grown substantially over the past year, reflecting the strong support for SBIA’s efforts by our nation’s leading private capital and institutional investors” said Brett Palmer, president of SBIA. “It’s important that we build on the momentum that we’ve achieved in the past year as we promote and highlight the incredibly important role private capital plays in driving innovation, job growth, and capital formation within America’s small business community.”

“SBIA is an outstanding advocate for its members. The team at SBIA is fantastic and has helped our business in several very tangible areas including advocacy, networking, and educational programs. We have been thrilled to be members of SBIA,” said Graham Weaver, partner at Alpine Investors IV, an SBIC headquartered in San Francisco.

New members included buyout, mezzanine, growth equity and venture capital investment strategies, while new LP firms included banks, funds of funds and others. SBIA is comprised of private equity, venture capital, business development companies and their institutional investors.

“SBIA is the leading industry association for small and lower middle market investors. SBIA helps facilitate GP to GP and GP to LP interactions, delivers best practices and industry knowledge, and drives business development amongst our members. The strong growth in new members this year is a testament to that effort,” said Charles McCusker, chairman of the SBIA and managing partner of Patriot Capital, a private investment group based in Baltimore.

“The aspect of the SBIA that we found so differentiating and compelling is its focus on the mutual success of both GPs and LPs in the small business investment community. We’re thrilled to have joined SBIA. It is a great network of senior investment professionals. We also now appreciate the benefit of strengthening policies that support strong domestic investment. We look forward to working with SBIA as we support investments in small-to-mid-sized companies,” said Tom Danis, managing principal, RCP Advisors, a Chicago private equity firm.