US firm Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr's eight-lawyer Munich office has split off to form a standalone practice.

The new firm, which is practising under the banner MLawGroup, is headed up by Wilmer Cutler Munich corporate partners Rainer Kreifels and Hubert Besner and has a further six associates. The new firm will focus on technology, corporate and venture capital work.

While the breakaway group hopes to take all its clients with it, both parties say the split was amicable and hope to maintain a referral relationship.

The US firm's German capabilities are now restricted to a 12-partner office in Berlin, a market from which a number of UK firms are vacating.

The latest UK firm to pull out of the German capital was London outfit Travers Smith, which formally announced its departure this week, while Lovells axed its Berlin offering last September.