As the iPhone 14 release nears, analyst Ming-Chi Kuo says Apple is increasingly concentrating its 7P lens orders for wide sensors to a single vendor.
The upcoming iPhone 14 Pro is rumored to add a larger 48MP lens, while keeping the other macro and ultra-wide sensors at 12MP. The analyst Ming Chi Kuo claims that its latest information from the supply chain shows that the component manufacturer Sunny Optical wins a growing share of Apple’s orders.
Sunny Optical wins the day
Concretely, Kuo explains that the “company’s capacity has increased significantly” and that it obtains a greater proportion of Apple’s 7P wide camera lens orders.
Sunny Optical is the largest iPhone 14 series wide camera 7P lens supplier, and its supply ratio greatly exceeds Largan, Genius and market consensus.
What Kuo means by the ratio exceeding “market consensus” is unclear, but he gives more specifics on the breakdown of orders by supplier.
The shipment distribution of Sunny Optical’s high-end 7P wide lens (used in two high-end iPhone 14 Pro) and low-end 7P wide lens (used in two low-end iPhone 14) were respectively 50-60% and 55-65%. The proportion of supply from Largan and Genius is about the same.
Kuo claims that increasing the capacity of Sunny Optical to produce the lenses means “the company will continue the price war to get more orders from Apple.”
Sunny Optical slots in for the iPhone 15
Furthermore, the analyst also predicts that Sunny Optical “may become the main supplier of the ToF lens for the iPhone 15 in 2023. As of now, the iPhone’s time-of-flight system, used in its LiDAR function, is mainly provided by Genius.