San Francisco, Jul 22 (IANS): Apple is reportedly planning to introduce periscope telephoto cameras into its iPhone lineup in 2022.

A periscope lens offers optical zoom capabilities not otherwise possible in a smartphone camera, allowing for 5x or even 10x optical zoom.

Periscope lenses have already seen their way into some smartphones including the OPPO Find X2 Pro and the Huawei P40 Pro Plus.

A new research note from Ming-Chi Kuo claims that the two strongest lens suppliers in Korea and China, Sunny Optical and Semco will join Apple's lens supply chain later this year and at the beginning of next year respectively, reports The Verge.

Kuo said that Semco will begin shipping iPhone lenses, including periscope motors, telephoto lenses in 2022 and a periscope telephoto lens, as well as voice coil motor technology which will ship in 2022.

The iPhone maker is expected to launch four new iPhones under the iPhone 12 series in September this year which would include two premium variants.

The iPhone 12 Pro will come in 6.1-inch or 6.7-inch sizes. The rear camera module on the device will house four sensors with a LiDAR scanner which was introduced in the recently launched Apple iPad Pro.

All four iPhone models are expected to feature OLED displays and 5G support.