Establishing Bad Boy

After starting the label, both Craig Mack and The Notorious B.I.G. quickly released hit singles, followed by similarly successful LPs, particularly B.I.G.'s Ready to Die. Puff Daddy, as he was then known, began signing more acts to Bad Boy, including, Dream, Carl Thomas, Faith Evans, Father MC, 112 and Total, as well as producing for Jodeci, Mary J. Blige, Usher, Lil' Kim, TLC, Mariah Carey, Boyz II Men, SWV, Aretha Franklin and others, and forming The Hitmen, an in-house production team. Ma$e and D-Block (known as "The Lox" at the time) soon joined Bad Boy, just as a widely publicized rivalry with the West Coast's Death Row Records was beginning. Combs and Biggie were criticized and parodied by Tupac Shakur and Suge Knight, in songs and interviews during the mid 1990s. Shakur was murdered in September, 1996.[5] Six months later, on March 9, 1997, the Notorious B.I.G. was murdered weeks before the release of his most successful album, Life After Death.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sean_Combs