Dreamworks vs Pixar

NEW YORK - If Steve Jobs and Jeffrey Katzenberg were cartoon characters, their eyes would be dollar signs.

Business is booming at the animation companies they helm. DreamWorks Animation is fresh off its latest hit, Shrek 2, which grossed $439 million domestically, making it the highest-grossing animated feature ever (and for that matter the third-highest domestic gross for any movie), according to Boxofficemojo.com. The soon-to-be-public animation studio currently has Shark Tale in theaters.

Pixar Animation Studio's (nasdaq: PIXR - news - people ) five films have grossed a total of $1.2 billion for an average of $239 million per film. Over several years, starting with Toy Story in 1995 through last years' hit Finding Nemo, Pixar has built up a brand name that is nearly as recognizable as that of its longtime distribution partner The Walt Disney Co. (nyse: DIS - news - people ), says Wade Holden, an analyst at Kagan Research.

"Pixar has never failed to deliver a hit," he says. And those hits bring profits: $125 million last year alone.

The picture is a little more complicated at DreamWorks, which has grossed a total of $1.25 billion with its nine films, averaging $139 million per picture. Sure, the Shrek series was a big hit, but there have been blunders too, like Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas, which grossed an anemic $26.5 million.

But has Pixar's reign ended? Its partnership with Disney is ending after this year's The Incredibles and next year's Cars. Warner Brothers, 20th Century Fox and Sony Pictures Entertainment have been rumored to be new partners, but the studio could decide to go it alone. Little is known about its first post-Disney picture. Reports say it will be called Ratatouille and is about a rat that lives in a fancy Parisian restaurant. Pixar has yet to name its next distribution partner.