Yesterday Patently Apple posted a report titled "LG Innotek, Apple's Largest Optics Partner, will unveil their Breakthrough Ultra-Compact Optical Zoom camera module at CES in January." Apple suppliers are notorious for remaining silent about working with Apple, so we noted in yesterday's report that "LG Innotek is still likely to be Apple's supplier for their iPhone 15 optical zoom module." Today, we can be a little more assured that the iPhone 15 will in fact use the new LG Innotek optical zoom camera module due to a new report posted this morning.

According to The Elec, "LG Innotek has formulated a plan to invest in new facilities worth 1.65 trillion won (US$1.289 Billion), which are required for production of foldable zoom and actuators for Apple's iPhone 15 series, which will be released next year. LG Innotek's investment in this new facility seems to be for the production of folded zoom, which is first applied to Apple's iPhone 15 series, actuators necessary for this, and other camera modules.

The biggest change in the camera module specifications of the iPhone 15 series next year is the application of folded zoom. Folded Zoom is a camera module that bends light with a prism and transmits it to the image sensor, which can reduce the camera bump on the back of the smartphone.

It is known that Apple plans to apply folded zoom to one type (Pro Max) in the iPhone 15 series next year and two types (Pro/Pro Max) in the iPhone 16 series next year. LG Innotek will also internalize the actuator technology required for folded zoom. High-definition shooting is possible only when the actuator moves multiple lenses quickly and accurately."

In a secondary report posted today by BusinessKorea, they noted that "LG Innotek is supplying camera modules for the iPhone. The proportion of sales to Apple in LG Innotek’s total sales continued to grow. The percentage rose from 61 percent in 2018 to 64 percent in 2019, 67 percent in 2020 and 75 percent in 2021. Until the third quarter of this year, LG Innotek depended on Apple for 74.8 percent of its sales."