HICKS JOINS QUALITY CONTROL AS CIO

Quality Control has named veteran industry figure Christopher Hicks Chief Innovation Executive for QC Media Holdings, which encompasses QC's recorded music (Migos, Lil Baby, City Girls), sports and publishing entities.

The terms of the equity-based arrangement will see Hicks identify, develop and launch partnerships and services across film, TV, digital, recorded music, music publishing and technology verticals.

Over the course of his 20-year career, Hicks has managed Grammy-winning songwriters (Bryan-Michael Cox, Johnta Austin) and served as a creative consultant to Usher, Mary J. Blige, Aliyah and more. As SVP of Warner Chappell Publishing, he signed and worked with T.I., Lil Wayne and The Dream, among others. As EVP of Island Def Jam, he played a pivotal role in Justin Bieber's development and signed Jennifer Lopez and contributed A&R expertise to her comeback album.

Hicks will focus on building out Quality Control's new music-publishing ventures. Along with company principals Pierre "P" Thomas and Kevin "Coach K" Lee, he intends to leverage the company's standing in popular culture and ability to capture marketshare to establish it as a pivotal development and acquisitions player.

Thomas commented, "Chris' presence represents a key expansion of the QC vision. Having an executive of his caliber on our team is an important step toward building our global business."

HITS' own chief innovation executive is focused on groundbreaking initiatives like printing out emails for senior management and ordering Postmates.