The Small Business Administration is considering setting a limit on the number of mentor-protege teams initially allowed to be formed under new governmentwide rules it is developing, according to a senior executive at the agency.

“We may have to limit the number of firms in the initial timeframe. We don’t know how big it will be,” Calvin Jenkins, deputy associate administrator of the SBA’s Office of Business Development and Government Contracting, said at a recent industry conference. “There is a lot of interest.”

Under the recent defense authorization law, the SBA was given authority over mentor-protege programs governmentwide.

Currently, the SBA oversees about 600 mentor-protege teams under the 8(a) business development program. Thirteen other federal agencies currently have their own mentor-protege programs; they are expected to be either aligned with, or possibly exempted from, a larger SBA-run program.

Many questions about the new governmentwide mentor-protege program are not settled, including whether to extend the 8(a) mentor-protege waiver from the rule against affiliation more broadly, Jenkins said.

‘There is lots of potential, but also lots of risk,” Jenkins said.

In related news, the SBA is preparing to circulate internally a draft rule for two previously-authorized mentor-protege programs within several weeks.