3 Top Executives Step Down at Internet Firm MarchFirst

MarchFirst Inc. said Monday that three top managers quit, including Chairman and Chief Executive Robert Bernard.

The Internet consultant said President and Chief Operating Officer Thomas Metz and Joseph Bong, executive vice president of client services, also resigned.

The company named as president Steve Pollema, executive vice president of global operations and said it hired a recruitment firm to help it fill the other positions.

MarchFirst, which helps companies build and expand Web sites, has seen demand fall as money-losing Internet companies cut spending. The company had a wider-than-expected fourth-quarter loss and has fired 1,550 workers in the last year to reduce costs.

The company’s shares have fallen 98% in the last year. The shares fell 14 cents to close at 98 cents on Nasdaq, after touching a 52-week low of 94 cents.

The resignations came a week after Chief Financial Officer Peter Murphy quit and was replaced by Michael Salvati, former CFO at Culligan Water Technologies Inc.

Chicago-based MarchFirst formed a three-member executive committee to run the company until it finds new management. Two committee members work for Francisco Partners, a private equity firm that agreed in December to invest $150 million in MarchFirst in exchange for preferred stock.

Francisco Partners was “actively involved” in the management changes, said James Dougherty, an analyst at Prudential Securities, who rates MarchFirst stock “hold.”

San Francisco-based Francisco Partners declined to comment.

Last month, MarchFirst reported a fourth-quarter loss of $6.72 billion, mostly because of$6.5 billion in acquisition costs.