Allen & Overy has relocated US corporate finance partner Jim Wickenden from London to Hong Kong following the departure of one of its most senior US partners in Asia, James Grandolfo.

Wickenden [pictured], who has been given the task of leading the US securities practice in the region, moved to Hong Kong earlier this month for an undefined period but is expected to stay in the city for the coming months.

His move is understood to be part of a wider troubleshooting mission by A&O to bolster its Asian US practice, which has suffered a loss with the departure of Grandolfo, who moved to Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy in October.

The group is also understood to have been affected by the relocation of corporate partner Mark Roppel to New York in January 2013 and the exit of several other partners who contributed to the US practice.

"Jim will take James' role for the time-being (there is no set timeframe for his stay)." said Joseph Tse, the firm's senior partner for Greater China.

"We still have a very strong team comprising three US qualified partners and 13 other lawyers. With lateral hires we are prepared to be opportunistic about good people, but there is no immediate plan to find a lateral hire."

Aside from the US practice, A&O has seen a number of changes in its Hong Kong office over the past 18 months.

Among these is a retreat from Hong Kong IPO work, once seen as one of the magic circle firm's core markets in the region.

Tse commented: "We realigned our Hong Kong practice about 18 months ago and individual practices are now better suited to the current market. So in corporate we are doing fewer IPOs than some of our competitors and, as a result, are more selective and strategic about those that we take on. This has been serving us very well over the last few months."

In contrast, magic circle rival Clifford Chance has said it is back on track to achieve its 2014/15 revenue target in Asia, aided by a stronger pipeline of Hong Kong IPO mandates.

Slaughter and May has also sought to increase its capacity in the market with the hire of US capital markets partner John Moore from Morrison & Foerster. Moore, the firm's first ever lateral partner hire, will assist with the US tranche on Hong Kong flotations.

Meanwhile, A&O has also taken the decision to run its entire capital markets practice out of Hong Kong, with no capital markets lawyers now based in Beijing.

This coincides with a strategy to focus less on state-owned enterprises (SOEs) at central government level, and more on Chinese corporates and provincial-level SOEs.

The firm also told Legal Week that it was expecting an increase in revenue from its Greater China practice of between 20% and 30% for 2013/14.