The Next Big Move For Cameras?

From a small space in Palo Alto, Calif., startup Light is looking to turn the camera industry on its head.

Smartphones have already decimated the market for compact, point-and-shoot cameras. Now, Light says it has a plan for the smartphone to replace high-end cameras too.

The company has been working for the last couple of years on an array of small cameras, each with a different focal length, taken in aggregate, that can mimic the zoom and high resolution of a larger camera without the unsightly bulge of a traditional zoom lens. It also sees a role for such arrays inside security cameras and other small devices.

Improving camera technology for phones is not unique to Light. Apple recently bought LinX, another startup working in the field of “computational photography.” Samsung released a series of phone-camera hybrid devices, and Nokia has released a couple of camera phones with a 41-megapixel lenses.

Taking a lesson from other camera startups, such as Lytro, which have struggled to shake up the camera industry, Light isn’t going it alone. The company has licensed its technology to Chinese manufacturer Foxconn, which makes Apple’s iPhones.

“We expect them to have smartphones in the market next year,” CEO Dave Grannan said in an interview.