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Apple is close to announcing it has signed a deal to sell HBO programs and movies on the iTunes website, according to HBO employees involved in executing the agreement.

HBO will begin selling some of its most popular television series on Apple’s iTunes Store, the companies announced on Tuesday.

HBO will offer The Sopranos, Sex and the City, Deadwood and Rome, as well as Flight of the Conchords and The Wire.

The deal marks the first time that Apple has agreed to a separate price structure for a content provider, one of the employees said. NBC pulled its programming from iTunes last summer after Apple refused to charge more than $1.99 for that network’s shows. In May, NBC struck a deal with Microsoft to sell its shows on the Zune website.

From mow on, NBC is the only major channel currently not offering its shows through iTunes. The store currently carries 800 different shows and has sold more than 150 million episodes.
The iTunes store isn’t a big cash cow for Apple, making up less than 10% of Apple’s $24 billion in sales last year, but is a big driver of iPod and Macintosh computer sales.