News Corp., the Rupert Murdoch company buying Dow Jones & Co., said fourth-quarter profit rose 4.5% after Fox News collected more fees from cable providers and the Italian pay-television unit added customers.

Net income increased to $890 million, or 28 cents a share, from $852 million, or 27 cents, a year earlier, New York-based News Corp. said yesterday in a statement. Profit beat the 27-cent average of 11 analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg. Sales rose 8.6% to $7.37 billion.

A 46% increase in earnings at the cable division helped make up for a decline at the film unit as Fox News renegotiated contracts with affiliates who carry the network. To expand the company’s news business, Mr. Murdoch will start a business news channel in October and last week agreed to buy Dow Jones & Co. for $5.2 billion, adding the Wall Street Journal.

“News Corp. is showing the benefit of being a conglomerate,” said Jason Helfstein, an analyst at CIBC World Markets who rates the shares “outperform.” “It is now going to be about how they successfully integrate Dow Jones,” he said.

Class A shares of News Corp., also the owner of 20th Century Fox and the MySpace social-networking site, rose 4 cents to $21 in extended trading after gaining 34 cents, or 1.7%, to $20.96 at 4:01 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. They have fallen 2.4% this year.

Sales topped the $7.32 billion average of eight analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg.

Fiscal 2008 operating income growth will be in the “low teens,” Chief Financial Officer David Devoe said on a conference call after results were released, without giving further details.

Profit at the cable network rose to $284 million in the period ended June 30, and revenue climbed 17% to $1.1 billion.

Fox News’s 10-year contracts with cable providers ended in October, giving the network a chance to increase fees. Created in 1996, the channel overtook Time Warner’s CNN as the most-watched news network in 2002 and now draws an audience twice as large as its rival in primetime.

Last week, a divided Bancroft family accepted Mr. Murdoch’s $60-a-share offer for Dow Jones after more than three months of debate over his influence on news coverage at the Journal, which has a daily circulation of 2.06 million.

Mr. Murdoch pledged to maintain editorial independence, winning enough support to complete the purchase when Bancroft family members controlling at least 37% of the company approved the deal.

Mr. Murdoch said on the call yesterday that the company plans to expand the Journal’s nonbusiness coverage to increase distribution in Europe and Asia and to compete with the New York Times. He said there are no plans to cut Dow Jones’s workforce.

Pairing Dow Jones “with the marketing power and global reach of News Corp. will vastly enhance its brand and extend its reach,” Mr. Murdoch said of the publisher. He also said he plans to sell Dow Jones’s local newspapers “very quickly,” without elaborating.

The purchase of Dow Jones, expected to be completed in the calendar fourth quarter, may bolster News Corp.’s planned financial news channel. The Fox Business Network will start broadcasting on October 15, News Corp. said last month.

“They may need to use their vast resources around the world to help the Journal become a more general news gathering organization,” said Richard Dorfman, managing director at Richard Alan Inc., an investment company in New York. “Murdoch recognizes the real home run to be his is the Internet. It’s why they put a new media type valuation on the Journal.”

Profit rose at the Sky Italia satellite broadcast unit as it attracted more users. For the year ending June 30, the unit added a net 368,000 subscribers, for a total of 4.2 million. Profit rose 85% to $155 million after costs tied to soccer’s World Cup dragged down earnings a year earlier. Sales at the satellite unit increased 15% to $865 million.

The television unit posted a 6.8% rise in sales to $1.43 billion, as higher revenue at the Fox network offset weaker results at MyNetworkTV and Star. Profit fell 4.5% to $385 million.

Sales and profit at News Corp.’s film division dropped as the quarter’s releases “Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer” and “Live Free or Die Hard” didn’t match the ticket sales of last year’s “Ice Age: The Meltdown” and the third installment of “XMen.” Sales fell 19% to $1.45 billion and profit slumped 47% to $106 million.

The book unit had a profit of $21 million, compared with a loss of $6 million a year earlier. Sales rose 15% to $295 million.

The newspaper unit’s profit rose 19% to $203 million. Earnings at News Corp.’s magazines and inserts units gained 25% to $81 million, as revenue rose 6.6% to $275 million.

Losses narrowed at the ‘Other’ segment, which includes Fox Interactive Media, to $17 million from $82 million on growth in advertising and search revenue at MySpace. Revenue for the segment jumped 89% to $753 million.

Profit in the year-earlier period was boosted by a gain of $134 million related to the sale of Sky Radio Ltd. in the Netherlands and Germany.