Apple's iTunes off to peachy start ... UK roll-out of download service outdoes analysts' expectations with massive first-week sales.(Downloads)

The UK music industry has welcomed impressive first-week sales from iTunes Music Store, which will generate an estimated 950,000 [pounds sterling] in income for record labels and publishers.

Apple said it sold 800,000 tracks Europe-wide in its first seven days of business, with the UK accounting for 56% or 450,000 tracks and France and Germany jointly accounting for the remaining 250,000.

Some voiced amazement at the figures, while even the more conservative said the results fell at the optimistic end of the scale. While Apple declined to discuss any details, the service provided data for the UK's first published Down load Chart at the end of last week, which fell in line with their figures.

With wholesale priced fixed just under 50p per track and PRS-MCPS royalty of around 5.4p, UK sales of around 450,000 will recoup more than 200,000 [pounds sterling] for labels and 24,000 [pounds sterling] for publishers and writers. At the same rate, the service could earn 10m [pounds sterling]-plus for labels within a year and 1.3m [pounds sterling] for the publishing business.

It is understood that Apple's figures count all albums business as individual track sales, with one album often adding up to 15 tracks. With anecdotal evidence also indicating that albums and singles sales break down 50:50--on a per track basis--it appears that the first week saw sales of around 15,000 albums, alongside 250,000 tracks.

EMI Music chairman and CEO Tony Wadsworth says, "We have always said that one of the key things is to give people a legal alternative and now there ...