Disney

Walt Disney Co. DIS -0.10% will shed up to 20% of jobs at its film studio as movie production shifts to its Marvel unit and DreamWorks Studios, Bloomberg News reported Monday citing two people with knowledge of the plans.

The reductions at Walt Disney Studios, in production, business development and other areas, will be made in the week of June 13, the people told Bloomberg.

One of the people said some people have already been laid off, according to Bloomberg.

Paul Roeder, a spokesman for Disney Studios, didn't immediately return Bloomberg's messages seeking comment.

Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Robert A. Iger has lead a restructuring of the studio to reflect these new business realities, scaling back the number of movies it produces and releases. Disney sold off its Miramax Films specialty movie label last year and consolidated the Burbank studio's marketing and distribution operations.

Helping lower its risk on the production side, the studio now relies more heavily on movies supplied by Steven Spielberg's DreamWorks Studios, which pays Disney a fee for releasing its films, and Marvel Entertainment, which it acquired two years ago for $4 billion.

Disney also gets a steady stream of big family movies from its Pixar Animation Studios unit, which it bought for $7.4 billion in 2006.

Since he was named to the post in 2009, Disney Studios chief Rich Ross has been reorganizing and streamlining the studio's marketing and distribution operations in response to falling DVD sales amid changing consumer habits.

Last November, he consolidated the distribution units of theatrical, home entertainment and pay television into a single group headed by Bob Chapek, the studio's former executive in charge of home entertainment.

Disney isn't alone in making staff reductions in response to the tougher business climate. Sony Pictures laid off 450 people last year, citing changing consumption patterns. More recently, Santa Monica-based independent studio Lionsgate laid off 17 people in its home entertainment division, though it hired several in its digital division. Paramount Pictures also is expected to cut costs in its home entertainment division.