One of many headline options of this yr’s iPhone line-up would be the iPhone 15 Professional Max periscope lens, permitting a lot better optical zoom for the telephoto lens. It’s more likely to enable no less than 10x zoom, in comparison with the utmost 3x out there on the iPhone 14 Professional and Professional Max.
A brand new report from Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo says that Apple is paying provider Largan simply $4 for this lens, a sum which barely permits the provider any revenue margin in any respect …
Background
iPhones supply a mixture of optical zoom, and digital zoom. The latter crops the photograph, so reduces decision, whereas optical zoom produces a full-resolution telephoto picture.
The better the optical zoom you need from a lens, the longer than lens must be. This poses issues for smartphones, whose depth limits the utmost doable size of a lens.
A periscope lens solves this drawback. After the sunshine enters the entrance factor of the lens, a prism bends the sunshine 90 levels in order that the remainder of the lens meeting will be horizontal inside the digicam physique. You may learn a extra detailed clarification right here.
Kuo has beforehand stated that the periscope lens can be unique to the iPhone 15 Professional Max. There have been conflicting experiences about whether or not or not the function will make it into the smaller iPhone 16 Professional subsequent yr.
iPhone 15 Professional periscope lens prices
Whereas it’s unlikely that Kuo’s textual content ought to be taken actually, to imply zero revenue, it does recommend that Largan’s margins on the lens are wafer-thin.
Largan is predicted to be the only real lens provider for this yr’s iPhone 15 Professional Max periscope digicam. The market might have overestimated the contribution of the periscope lens to Genius’s income and revenue for 2H23–1H24.
The ASP for Largan’s shipped periscope digicam lenses is round USD 4 (together with the prisms), notably decrease than the market consensus of USD 4.5–5 or increased. It’s value noting that the worth of USD 4 implies that Largan can not revenue from the periscope digicam lens.
Apple’s orders for iPhone digicam lenses have typically been cut up between Largan and Genius, permitting the Cupertino firm to play one off in opposition to the opposite to realize essentially the most aggressive pricing. This yr it appears Largan acquired all of the orders, however apparently needed to shave its worth considerably to take action.
Kuo goes on to say that Genius will obtain periscope lens for subsequent yr’s iPhone 16, driving the element value even decrease.
Picture: Sony
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