Columbia Pictures executives have already started to negotiate with David Koepp to write the script for a fourth installment of the Spider-Man franchise - nearly five months before Spider-Man 3 even hits theaters, reports Variety.

Koepp, who most recently wrote the draft of the Indiana Jones 4 project that got George Lucas, Steven Spielberg and Harrison Ford to reteam for Paramount, scripted the original 2002 Spider-Man film that launched the studio's most lucrative franchise.

The studio would release Spider-Man 4 in 2009 or 2010.