BusinessWeek’s Alex Salkever says that Apple would profit nicely from spinning out its digital music business (iPod and iTunes) before the market gets commoditized. “If Apple were to spin out a minority stake of its iPod business, it could rake in big bucks in an initial public offering,” writes Salkever. “With the iPod on track to become a $1 billion business in the next year or so, Apple could expect to pull in at least that amount by selling a 40% stake. Then, Jobs could let someone else run the daily operations and the music side of things, including iTMS.”
