If there is one common theme in the German legal market of late it is that some international law firms are struggling there.

Some have opted to cut back their presence in Germany after strategic reviews, while other exits have involved whole teams moving to rival firms or setting up boutiques. The overall picture is of a market which some are struggling to make work.

The latest example of this is Olswang, which announced in June that 13 equity partners "along with their colleagues" would leave the firm's Berlin base "to grow their practice under a different brand".

The entire Berlin office is now understood to be in recruitment talks with other international firms in the city, including Morrison & Foerster and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, and Olswang is set to close its office in the third quarter this year, leaving it with one base in Munich.

Meanwhile, the Berlin office of Swedish firm Magnusson also announced in June that it will split off into an independent boutique, just two years after it was formed.

Other firms have simply opted to scale back their presence. In April Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe announced it was halving its German network by shutting its Berlin and Frankfurt offices later this year. And Clifford Chance has completed the firm's largest region-specific appraisal in years resulting in at least nine partners leaving its three German bases this year.

These firms' troubles follow a string of other exits over the past few years.

In 2014, King & Wood Mallesons closed in Berlin, leaving it with two bases in Munich and Frankfurt, while the year before Shearman & Sterling withdrew from both Duesseldorf and Munich. It now has only a sole base in Frankfurt.

Also in 2013, Hogan Lovells closed its base in the German capital, after its entire office departed to Morrison & Foerster.

It all begs the question of why international firms are struggling to make the market work. And are there deeper roots to the problem?

One reason some international firms have languished in Germany is that it is more difficult to establish a central base.

"Germany is a federal state so you have various industrial hubs. It's very difficult to decide where to be," says a Berlin-based partner at a UK firm. There are around 40 international law firms with offices in Germany, according to Chambers & Partners. This compares to around 40 in France, primarily in Paris, and around 20 in Spain, primarily in Madrid and Barcelona.

A former Germany managing partner adds: "If you're a private equity lawyer then you will gravitate towards Munich, if you want to be a finance lawyer you will move to Frankfurt, and for general industrial stuff you will want to go to Duesseldorf."

Moreover, while Berlin does offer public sector, real estate and technology legal work, it does not offer the same "depth of client base" as other major German cities, says a managing partner of a global law firm.

He says: "To be perfectly candid, lawyers like to live in Berlin but they travel four days a week to other German offices."

In addition, there is potentially more pressure on fees in Germany than is typical in other jurisdictions. "If you then have American law firms spilling into the German market they're all surprised when they get to know what hourly rates are here. We are far below London rates," says the Berlin-based partner.

The former Germany managing partner adds: "Some areas of Germany are very challenged and fee sensitive which seems surprising to people outside Germany."

However, partners in the country say that second and third tier international firms suffer more from this in Germany. "There is a lot of fee sensitivity around the middle market. But if you're doing high quality sophisticated legal transactions I don't think there is the disparity people would claim between UK, US and Germany," says the former Germany managing partner.

Certainly fee levels may have been a factor in the Olswang Berlin office partners' departure.

Ex-Olswang partners have suggested the firm's real estate practice, which includes lateral hires from Freshfields, felt "held back" as it has been generating "significant fee levels". One says: "I think the closure was more driven by them deciding to leave."

A second former partner says the Berlin real estate restructuring team have been outperforming the London practice. "They have been really driving the Berlin office. They've done very well and are certainly very busy."

An Olswang partner says: "The firm has a strong technology, media and telecommunications focus so Munich is a much more natural place to be than Berlin. The fact is that the majority of the Berlin practice is heavily dependent on real estate; it is the more active practice at the moment."

Over half of the firm's Berlin office work in the real estate team. In total, there are 11 real estate partners among the 19 Berlin partners listed on its website.

This number includes some of the high-profile Freshfields recruits in 2009 such as Germany managing partner Christian Schede, previously a real estate partner at the magic circle's Berlin office for seven years. Olswang declined to comment further on the reasons for the split from the Berlin office.

Some firms have also struggled in Germany due to heavy competition in the M&A sector, one Munich based partner says. He says that between 80 and 90% of international firms focus on M&A partly because it is "more difficult to establish banking relationships to do finance".

However, the latest firm to launch a new office in Germany, bucking the trend of closures, was motivated by existing relationships in the finance sector.

Reed Smith's Munich managing partner Stefan Kugler explains why this drove the firm to open an office Frankfurt, alongside its existing base in Munich: "Reed Smith has many clients in the finance sector - and many have operations in Germany and in Frankfurt and our relationship with them continues to expand," he says.

He says that if firms do already have these relationships then it is possible to justify an opening.

The key is to determine a strong reason for opening in Germany, concludes the former Germany managing partner. "You need to be in Germany for a reason," he says. "If you set up and expect to run it like London then you will have difficulties. Too often lawyers expect work to come to them instead of understanding the German market."

If there is one common theme in the German legal market of late it is that some international law firms are struggling there.

Some have opted to cut back their presence in Germany after strategic reviews, while other exits have involved whole teams moving to rival firms or setting up boutiques. The overall picture is of a market which some are struggling to make work.

The latest example of this is Olswang, which announced in June that 13 equity partners "along with their colleagues" would leave the firm's Berlin base "to grow their practice under a different brand".

The entire Berlin office is now understood to be in recruitment talks with other international firms in the city, including Morrison & Foerster and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, and Olswang is set to close its office in the third quarter this year, leaving it with one base in Munich.

Meanwhile, the Berlin office of Swedish firm Magnusson also announced in June that it will split off into an independent boutique, just two years after it was formed.

Other firms have simply opted to scale back their presence. In April Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe announced it was halving its German network by shutting its Berlin and Frankfurt offices later this year. And Clifford Chance has completed the firm's largest region-specific appraisal in years resulting in at least nine partners leaving its three German bases this year.

These firms' troubles follow a string of other exits over the past few years.

In 2014, King & Wood Mallesons closed in Berlin, leaving it with two bases in Munich and Frankfurt, while the year before Shearman & Sterling withdrew from both Duesseldorf and Munich. It now has only a sole base in Frankfurt.

Also in 2013, Hogan Lovells closed its base in the German capital, after its entire office departed to Morrison & Foerster.

It all begs the question of why international firms are struggling to make the market work. And are there deeper roots to the problem?

One reason some international firms have languished in Germany is that it is more difficult to establish a central base.

"Germany is a federal state so you have various industrial hubs. It's very difficult to decide where to be," says a Berlin-based partner at a UK firm. There are around 40 international law firms with offices in Germany, according to Chambers & Partners. This compares to around 40 in France, primarily in Paris, and around 20 in Spain, primarily in Madrid and Barcelona.

A former Germany managing partner adds: "If you're a private equity lawyer then you will gravitate towards Munich, if you want to be a finance lawyer you will move to Frankfurt, and for general industrial stuff you will want to go to Duesseldorf."

Moreover, while Berlin does offer public sector, real estate and technology legal work, it does not offer the same "depth of client base" as other major German cities, says a managing partner of a global law firm.

He says: "To be perfectly candid, lawyers like to live in Berlin but they travel four days a week to other German offices."

In addition, there is potentially more pressure on fees in Germany than is typical in other jurisdictions. "If you then have American law firms spilling into the German market they're all surprised when they get to know what hourly rates are here. We are far below London rates," says the Berlin-based partner.

The former Germany managing partner adds: "Some areas of Germany are very challenged and fee sensitive which seems surprising to people outside Germany."

However, partners in the country say that second and third tier international firms suffer more from this in Germany. "There is a lot of fee sensitivity around the middle market. But if you're doing high quality sophisticated legal transactions I don't think there is the disparity people would claim between UK, US and Germany," says the former Germany managing partner.

Certainly fee levels may have been a factor in the Olswang Berlin office partners' departure.

Ex-Olswang partners have suggested the firm's real estate practice, which includes lateral hires from Freshfields, felt "held back" as it has been generating "significant fee levels". One says: "I think the closure was more driven by them deciding to leave."

A second former partner says the Berlin real estate restructuring team have been outperforming the London practice. "They have been really driving the Berlin office. They've done very well and are certainly very busy."

An Olswang partner says: "The firm has a strong technology, media and telecommunications focus so Munich is a much more natural place to be than Berlin. The fact is that the majority of the Berlin practice is heavily dependent on real estate; it is the more active practice at the moment."

Over half of the firm's Berlin office work in the real estate team. In total, there are 11 real estate partners among the 19 Berlin partners listed on its website.

This number includes some of the high-profile Freshfields recruits in 2009 such as Germany managing partner Christian Schede, previously a real estate partner at the magic circle's Berlin office for seven years. Olswang declined to comment further on the reasons for the split from the Berlin office.

Some firms have also struggled in Germany due to heavy competition in the M&A sector, one Munich based partner says. He says that between 80 and 90% of international firms focus on M&A partly because it is "more difficult to establish banking relationships to do finance".

However, the latest firm to launch a new office in Germany, bucking the trend of closures, was motivated by existing relationships in the finance sector.

Reed Smith's Munich managing partner Stefan Kugler explains why this drove the firm to open an office Frankfurt, alongside its existing base in Munich: "Reed Smith has many clients in the finance sector - and many have operations in Germany and in Frankfurt and our relationship with them continues to expand," he says.

He says that if firms do already have these relationships then it is possible to justify an opening.

The key is to determine a strong reason for opening in Germany, concludes the former Germany managing partner. "You need to be in Germany for a reason," he says. "If you set up and expect to run it like London then you will have difficulties. Too often lawyers expect work to come to them instead of understanding the German market."