Making movies available through Apple’s online media service has added approximately $4 million to the company’s bottom line, AppleInsider has confirmed. Walt Disney revealed the success of its partnership with Apple during its fourth quarter financial call, where it admitted profits of $782 million, exceeding analyst expectations. Disney predicts that online movie sales will generate $50 million in the first year of the scheme. It looks like Apple is selling nearly 9,000 movies every day through its US-only service. The company also confirmed is has received enquiries from the US financial regulator, the Securities and Exchange Commission, related to stock options grants at newly acquired Pixar. The success of movie downloads via Apple’s iTunes store will surely be of interest to Microsoft, which is set to launch its Zune MP3, photo and video player range imminently (though not until early next year in the UK). Zune will be used as a launchpad for Microsoft’s own online media downloads portal focused around the revamped version of Windows Media Player which it released late last month.
