'Outstanding' year for Walt Disney Company

News

Samantha Loveday Nov 9 2007, 10:08am

Licensing and merchandising contributes to rise in revenue and operating income for fiscal 2007.

The president and CEO of the Walt Disney Company has praised the "across the board creative strength" of the firm, after it posted record earnings for its fiscal year 2007.

Revenues for the year ending September 29th 2007 were up five per cent from 2006 to $35.510 billion. The quarter ending on the same date was also up slightly, to $8.9 billion.

Segment operating income for the year was $7.827 billion, up 23 per cent over the same period in 2006.

Consumer Products revenues for the year increased seven per cent to $2.3 billion, and segment operating income increased two per cent to $631m. For the quarter, revenues increased five per cent to $590m, and segment operating income was up ten per cent to $153m.

The growth was primarily due to growth in merchandising licensing, partially offset by higher video game development costs at Disney Interactive Studios. Higher earned royalties across multiple product categories - led by Cars merchandise - can be attributed to the rise.

Meanwhile, the continued success of High School Musical was largely responsible for the boost in operating income for the fourth quarter.

Media networks, parks and resorts and studio entertainment also performed well.

"We've delivered another year of outstanding financial results, powered by across-the-board creative strength," said Robert Iger, president and CEO. "We believe our strong brands, combined with high quality creative content and our ability to promote and distribute that content across multiple businesses and platforms, gives us a unique ability to continue delivering growth and value to our shareholders."