Tickets.com President Timothy Kelly Resigns

Timothy E. Kelly is leaving as president of Costa Mesa online ticketing company Tickets.com Inc. to rejoin Sprint Corp., the nation’s third largest long-distance telephone company.

Kelly, 42, who left Sprint in 1999 to join Tickets.com, has been named president of consumer services at Sprint.

Tickets.com’s co-chairman and chief executive, W. Thomas Gimple, will reassume direct responsibility for the company’s operations. Kelly will not be replaced, the company said.

Instead, Tickets.com has named three division presidents. Dan M. Afrasiabi will head the ticketing services group, Andrew W. Donkin will oversee the Internet ticketing group, and Christopher Goodhart will head the international group.

Kelly, who started at Sprint in 1994, became vice president of marketing for consumer services in 1998.

Tickets.com has logged solid sales gains for three years, but losses have surged as well. In 1999, the company lost $63.4 million on sales of $45.9 million.

The stock, which has lost 98% of its value over the last 52 weeks, closed Thursday at 31 cents, off 3 cents a share, in Nasdaq trading.