ScottishPower Renewables (SPR) and Vattenfall have split the 7.2GW zone into two roughly equal areas, with SPR developing projects in the southern area, including the 714MW East Anglia One project.
SPR will also develop the East Anglia Three project, while Vattenfall will continue developing the northern part of the zone, with the East Anglia Four project.
The two developers are still negotiating with the Crown Estate to determine the location of the two projects still in development and possible further projects, within the 7.2GW total capacity of the zone.
Both firms will still share zone-wide survey data, meteorological data and other common crossovers, SPR said.
SPR managing director for offshore wind, Jonathan Cole, said: "We need to move our focus from understanding the wider zone characteristics, which we have done successfully in partnership with Vattenfall, to ensuring that each individual project gets the specific attention that it requires."
The move comes as the seabed manager, the Crown Estate, agreed to replace "zone development agreements" with "project-specific agreements" for some Round Three projects.
Zone development agreements were signed between developers and the Crown Estate when the Round 3 offshore zones were awarded in 2010. They set the agreed area for the developers to investigate the feasibility for an offshore project.
New project-specific agreements aim to streamline the relationship between the developer and the Crown Estate, and moves responsibility of the seabed that will not be used for offshore wind back to the land manager.
"Developers have had the broader area agreements for a few years and they are working to a point where they knew which projects they want to take forward," explained a Crown Estate spokesperson.
"Once they move from having a zone agreement to a project-specific agreement it means a much clearer idea of what seabed rights they would be using, and there's clarity in terms of returning seabed that will not be used for offshore wind development back to the Crown Estate, which also streamlines the arrangements that they have," the spokesperson added.
Eneco and EDF Energy have handed back the left-over area in the Navitus Bay zone. The 970MW Navitus Bay project is awaiting a final decision by the UK government's energy minister, expected in September.
Also, the Forewind consortium has handed some of the land back from the 7.2GW Dogger Bank zone, including the proposed site of the Teesside C and D projects. This reduces the zone to four 1.2GW projects, which will be taken forward by the consortium.
The Crown Estate said it was still in discussion with other Round Three developers about replacing the area agreements to site-specific agreements. Round Three also includes the 3GW Hornsea zone and the 3.65GW Firth of Forth zone in Scotland.
