Speaking at a conference yesterday, Time Warner Executive Vice President and CFO John Martin said digital distribution has the potential to lift film studios’ bottom lines instead of hurt them.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Martin said at the Merrill Lynch Fall Preview conference in Marina Del Rey, Calif., that Time Warner hasn’t found that its digital business is hurting DVD sales.

Martin said that in Time Warner’s day-and-date cable video-on-demand (VOD) trials, VOD buy rates were up more than 50 percent, while DVD sell-through increased 10 percent.

He also said that the VOD dollar unit contribution was three-and-a-half times better for the studios than in physical rentals. Digital sales, which were mainly on Apple’s iTunes, saw a 40 percent increase when compared with the physical rentals.

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