Rick Phillips
CEO, PRESIDENT, GENERAL MANAGER, BUSINESS LEADER
Rick Phillips is an accomplished manager, innovative leader, and corporate entrepreneur with repeated successful outcomes building technology and media businesses. Rick now provides consulting and investment advice as the leader of ASH Partners; Rick is serving as a consultant and expert witness in a significant video-game industry case, and over the past year has advised a video-game company on a major acquisition and evaluated an investment opportunity in the gaming space for a leading private-equity firm. Previously, Rick served as President, Publishing and Licensing at FoxNext Games, where he founded Fox’s first-party video gaming business and expanded its game licensing business more than five-fold. In this role, Rick co-managed Fox’s gaming business, and led all marketing, publishing and licensing activities for the company’s self-published games. Rick also managed the mobile video licensing business at Fox from 2012 – 2014 and expanded this business significantly.
Rick has more than 20 years of experience driving revenue growth and building asset value in the media and technology sectors. He was a senior executive at leading companies, including Microsoft Corporation, where Rick and his team created the first over-the-top digital video service (Xbox Live Video) in 2006. Mr. Phillips was an executive at Gemstar-TV Guide International, Liberty Global, and MGM Worldwide Television. Earlier in his career, Rick worked at Liberty Media Corporation, The Walt Disney Company, and Goldman, Sachs & Co.
Rick holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Arts from Harvard College. He also serves on the Board of Directors and is Chairman of the Compensation Committee of Audible Magic Corporation, and is a Director of Mise-en-Place Restaurant Services.
He currently lives in Los Angeles with his wife, Elissa, and their three children.
Content & Articles by Rick Phillips
Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) for Early Stage Companies
In our latest session from the Mucker Growth Series featuring Ethan Smith from Graphite, we explored AEO, a significant new approach for optimizing visibility in AI-driven search, particularly relevant as...
Startup Guide to AI Visibility: Be the Brand ChatGPT Recommends
Introduction Today, users aren’t just searching on Google. They’re asking ChatGPT, Claude, Google’s Gemini, Perplexity, and other AI systems for advice. AI visibility is the new frontier of brand awareness....
Practical Uses of AI & Automation for Startup Operations
In a recent Mucker Growth Series session, we invited Rock Vitale, Founder & CEO of Easie, to share how he’s helped early-stage teams move from manual, fragmented workflows to streamlined,...
2025 New York Tech Week Recap Of Mucker Sessions
Last week during New York Tech Week 2025, we joined more than 1,000 events hosted by founders, investors, and VCs. This post is a full Mucker recap of the three...
How to Build a Customer Support Function for Startups Using AI Tools with Alex Velinov
Delivering high-quality customer support can be one of the most resource-draining parts of a startup. The good news: we’re at a turning point where founders can use AI tools to...
Zero → 100: The Exact Steps We Took to Close Our First 100 Paying Customers
Going from zero customers to 100 in just four months sounds impossible—unless you’re a founder willing to roll up your sleeves and hustle relentlessly. I’m Gaurav Bhattacharya, co-founder of Jeeva.ai,...
