Disney predicts $50M in iTunes sales in first year

Posted Sep 20th 2006 4:10PM by Matthew Himler
Filed under: Good news, Apple Inc (AAPL)

Disney CEO Robert Iger, speaking at Goldman Sachs Communacopia XV conference in NYC, announced late Tuesday that Disney has sold 125,000 digital copies of its films through the Apple Computer Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) iTunes movie store in less than a week, generating over a million dollars in revenue. The Associated Press reports that The Walt Disney Co. (NYSE:DIS) expects to sell $50 million worth of movies in its first year partnered with iTunes store. "We believe that this is just the beginning," Iger said; "We're extremely confident that we'll easily be able to generate about $50 million in incremental revenue in the first year putting movies on this platform."

More importantly, the success of Disney's deal with iTunes may quell the fear by many motion picture executives that Apple's movie store will hinder DVD sales, likely the reason other studios have been reluctant to sign on. Iger claims, "selling shows online has not cannibalized sales of DVDs, nor has it hurt traditional TV viewing."

This third-party endorsement from the Disney chief may pave the way for other film companies to jump on the Apple bandwagon.

Tags: apple disney itunes, AppleDisneyItunes

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

9-20-2006 @ 4:42PM

Jeff said...

Yes, I believe all the critics and non-believers are just that... They "critic"ize because its their job to sound negative. I think anyone under 30, and probably a lot now over 30,get everything online. No matter how big these industries are, they can't deny the direction of the consumer. It's an easy choice for these studios when they consider hmmm, lose to piracy and ripped DVD's or just give the consumer what they want and earn some cash on downloads. I dont know how much they pay for the packaging on DVD's but I'm sure streamlining the system to for downloads rather than hard copies should have benefits too.

9-20-2006 @ 7:56PM

dimes said...

I don't see the iTunes movie downloads catching on until Apple releases the iTV box next year that streams the file to a TV set.

The iPod screen is way too small to use for movie viewing, and who wants to watch a movie on their computer screen when they have an entertainment center sitting in their living rooms?