Buyout boom: move aside New York, the Bay Area is attracting its share of deal-hungry buyout firms.

Long the center of the venture capital universe, the Bay Area is rapidly also becoming a magnet for a generation of new funds focused on mergers and buyouts.

Of the top 25 buyout firms listed in Galante's Venture Capital & Private Equity Directory, only seven headquartertered outside New York. Three of those firms are based in the Bay Area, making it the next favorite locale.

The region also boasts 10 of the top 100 private equity funds in the country, representing both the rise of traditional buyout funds and the growth and diversification of some venture capital funds. Further down the list, 68 of the 500 largest funds now reside in the Bay Area, and a continued frenzy of fund raising probably will add several more this year.

Silver Lake Partners, a partnership of venture and buyout firms, has raised a $1 billion fund aimed at technology buyouts. San Francisco's Hellman & Friedman is raising a $2.5 billion successor to its $1.5 billion buyout fund. Meanwhile, upstarts like the Swander Pace Capital fund and veterans like McCown De Leeuw & Co., the Shansby Group and Duff Ackerman & Goodrich are also becoming more prominent in the buyout world.

The Bay Area's business style is as different from New York as North Beach is from Manhattan. But as it becomes more accepted …