Viacom Inc., owner of MTV Networks and the Paramount Pictures movie studio, said fourth-quarter profit rose fourfold, buoyed by the purchase of DreamWorks SKG.

Net income increased to $480.8 million, or 69 cents a share, from $129.5 million, or 17 cents, a year earlier, the New York-based company said today in a statement distributed by PR Newswire. Sales rose to $3.59 billion from $2.72 billion. Profit of 65 cents before one-time items beat the 57-cent average estimate of 13 analysts in a Bloomberg survey.

Filmed entertainment revenue doubled after the $1.6 billion acquisition of DreamWorks last year. Chief Executive Officer Philippe Dauman, installed by Chairman Sumner Redstone in September, also succeeded in reviving sales and profit growth at the cable networks. Since taking over from Tom Freston he reorganized the MTV cable-television unit, naming a team of executives to put the network's shows on the Internet.

``Investors are focused on what Philippe is doing to fix the international cable-TV situation and getting Paramount to perform up to Sumner's expectations,'' Miller said. ``He's trying to squeeze as much value out of personnel as possible.''

Sales beat the $3.17 billion average estimate.

Viacom last month said it will cut 250 jobs at MTV Networks, or 5.5 percent of workers at the unit, as part of the music channel's strategy to draw more users to the company's Web site.

Class B shares of Viacom fell 20 cents to $39.04 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading yesterday. They have declined 2.3 percent in the past year.

Viacom, which split from sister company CBS Corp. last year, profit fell 67 percent in the fourth-quarter of 2005 after losses at the Paramount because of flops such as ``Elizabethtown'' and ``Aeon Flux.''

Redstone, 83, split off CBS from the company in December, 2005 to allow Viacom to focus on its cable networks and film production businesses. A month later Viacom bought DreamWorks SKG for $1.6 billion to help Brad Grey, head of the company's Paramount Pictures, boost film production.

Dauman took over Redstone fired Freston for failing to push the company quickly enough into the Internet and for losing the auction for MySpace.com to News Corp.

Bloomberg"