Sony Could Supply Image Sensors For Apple
Everyone is eagerly waiting in to see if, at June 5’s Apple Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple announces the next generation iPhone 5. In an interview with Wall Street Journal, Sir Howard Stringer (CEO of Sony) is said to have slipped plans from Sony to supply Apple with eight megapixel image sensors for the iPhone 5. On the blog 9 to 5 Mac, Seth Weintraub noted how Stringer stated that the factory that is making image sensors for Apple was affected by the earthquake and tsunami in Japan.
Typically Apple gets its image sensors for its iOS devices from OmniVision which offered backside-illuminated five megapixel CMOS image sensors for the iPhone 4. OmniVision’s factory in Japan has reported to be in some way negatively affected by the tsunami, thus delaying the supply of image sensors for Apple products.
Sony also makes backside-illuminated Exmor R image sensors recently used in the Xperia Arc model. Thus it could have been and indirect offer from Sony to Apple to purchase the image sensors from them rather then having the iPhone 5 delayed. Currently there is no official report about Sony supplying the image sensors, and it’s muddy as to why Sony would supply parts to one of its competitors.
Will the iPhone 5 have an 8 megapixel image sensor? Probably, at least that’s something everyone can agree on. Will the image sensors come from Sony or OmniVision? Right now, no one is sure, it’s all a little ambiguous.
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