Deal puts movies on iTunes quicker

Downloads available same day as DVDs

"Juno" is among the first movies released on iTunes' new service. (DOANE GREGORY/FOX SEARCHLIGHT)

NEW YORK - Apple Inc., maker of the iPod media player, will sell movies through its iTunes online store the same day they are released on DVD, building on its success as a music retailer.

New releases from studios, including Paramount Pictures and Warner Bros., will cost $14.99, Apple said yesterday. Previously, customers may have had to wait several weeks after the DVD debut. The service will start with movies such as "Juno" this week.

Chief executive Steve Jobs is counting on movies to increase sales of iPods, Macintosh computers, and Apple TV, a device that lets users watch downloaded films on their widescreen televisions. In January, Jobs said customers had bought 7 million movies, missing his expectations. Apple began selling movies and television shows on iTunes in October 2005.

Michael Gartenberg, an analyst at JupiterResearch in New York, said "What Apple is doing is knocking down one more barrier for why you wouldn't want to buy a movie from them."

New titles will also be available from Twentieth Century Fox, Walt Disney Co., Universal Studios Home Entertainment, Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc., Lions Gate Entertainment Corp., Image Entertainment Inc., and First Look Studios Inc. Studios are betting that Apple will repeat its success in music with films, Gartenberg said.

Apple, based in Cupertino, Calif., rose $6.05, or 3.5 percent, to $180. The stock has lost 9.1 percent this year.

ITunes is the most popular site for legal music downloads, according to NPD Group Inc. Apple said last month that iTunes surpassed Wal-Mart Stores Inc. as the biggest US music retailer.

Apple offers more than 1,500 films, including 200 in high definition. Studios already sell older movies for $9.99 each and provide films for rental under a service Jobs introduced in January.

Digital movie revenue industrywide is about $200 million a year, compared with $25 billion for the DVD market, said Steve Diamond, an entertainment law professor at Santa Clara University in Santa Clara, Calif.

Hollywood studios schedule the release of their movies to maximize viewers and revenue, he said. After a theatrical release, films are sold on pay-per-view. They then appear on DVD before they're broadcast on premium cable channels.