Will the iPhone 5 sport an 8 MP camera from Sony?

Well, it looks like we have some more insight into why the iPhone 5 will be delayed until later this Fall. In what may very well have been a slip of the tongue, Sony CEO Howard Stringer intimated that Sony has been contracted to supply 8 megapixel cameras for the iPhone 5.

This past Friday, Stringer sat down for an interview with Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal. When the recent earthquakes and tsunami in Japan came up, Stringer said that operations in Sony's Sendai plant had been affected and that the company therefore had to delay shipments of 8 megapixel camera sensors to Apple. A paraphrased quote of Stringer's blurb reads, "Our best sensor technology is built in one of the (tsunami) affected factories.  Those go to Apple for their iPhones…or iPads.  Isn’t that something?  They buy our best sensors from us."

The iPhone 4 currently boasts a 5 megapixel camera, but high end smartphones are now sporting 8 megapixel sensors, much like Sony's own Xperia Pro smartphone which features CMOS sensor technology to account for photos taken in low light environments. Note, though, that Camera sensors used in previous iterations of the iPhone have all come from Omnivision, but reports that Omnivision's upcoming 8 megapixel camera was experiencing poor chip yields prompted Apple to tap Sony to supply, for the first time, camera sensors for the iPhone.

Sony of course competes with Apple on a few fronts, the irony of which wasn't lost on Stringer.

"It always puzzles me,” Stringer explained. “Why would I make Apple the best camera?”

Well, when Apple routinely sells millions of iPhone units per quarter, it's certainly gotta be nice to get a piece of that action.

Last week, it came to light that this year's WWDC would not feature the introduction of a new iPhone model. Indeed, thre are also reports that Steve Jobs won't be delivering this year's keynote, but rather marketing chief Phil Schiller. Apple has routinely used WWDC to showcase new iPhone hardware, and while theories abounded regarding the lack of a new iPhone announcement and perhaps release this Summer, it turns out that the hold-up may be nothing more than a delay in acquiring component parts.

With iPhone 5 not on the agenda at this year's WWDC, Apple will focus exclusively on the upcoming OS X Lion and iOS 5. OS X Lion has reportedly reached golden candidate status while the bulk of planned iOS 5 features remain relatively unknown. There have been whispers through the grapevine, though, that iOS 5 will be a major update and will showcase a bevy of location-based features.