Bogle & Gates, the 180-lawyer Seattle firm, is to break up after a team of rainmaking partners defected to the firm with which it was holding merger talks.

The collapse of the 100-year-old Bogle & Gates, Seattle's second-biggest firm, came after national firm Dorsey & Whitney recruited eight international and domestic corporate partners from Bogle & Gates while the firm was still trying to bring about a merger.

A full merger would have led the 500-lawyer Minneapolis-headquartered Dorsey & Whitney into the top 15 US law firms.