The company was founded in 1993 by a coalition of African-American artists and writers, consisting of Dwayne McDuffie, Denys Cowan, Michael Davis, Derek T. Dingle and Christopher Priest.

In essence, DC licensed the characters, editorial services, and creative content of the Milestone books for an annual fee and a share of the profits.

[6] The biggest conflict they had was when an issue of Static showed the hero kissing his girlfriend on a bed, with unopened condoms visible.

They also suffered from several disadvantages: the comics market was experiencing a glut of "new universes" as several other publishers launched superhero lines around the same time (a slump would start in 1993 and a market crash in 1994), and a significant number of retailers and readers perceived the Milestone books to be "comics for blacks" and assumed they would not interest non-African-American readers.

The perception of "comics for blacks" would be used by industry insiders to justify these early sales issues, ignoring the existence of the glut; few people at the time wanted to believe that the market conditions might be unsound and excuses were needed for why newer companies were struggling.

Heroes, a new team book featuring Static and several of its more popular second-tier characters, was launched, but failed to sell well enough to justify an ongoing series.

It became primarily a licensing company, focusing on the Emmy Award and Humanitas Prize-winning animated series Static Shock.

In a January 2015 interview, writer Reginald Hudlin discussed a relaunch of Milestone Media Group, along with surviving co-founders Denys Cowan and Derek Dingle.

[13] The following July, DC Comics announced the creation of "Earth-M" within their multiverse, which would be home to the earlier Milestone characters as well as new ones, and that one or two Earth M imprint titles would be published annually, as well as miniseries and one-shots.

Later the production staff would expand to include Erica Helene, Jason Medley, Jacqueline Ching, Joe Daniello, Andrew Burrell, Marcus Bennett, and Michelline Hess.