According to a Reuters report, Foxconn Chairman Terry Gou told the media after a Wednesday business forum that coping with the overwhelming demand for the popular Apple iPhones was becoming increasing difficult for the company’s flagship iPhone- and iPad-assembler Hon Hai Precision Industry, which is the main listed entity of the parent Foxconn Technology Group.

Gou’s disclosure that “it's not easy to make the iPhones,” and that Foxconn was “falling short of meeting the huge demand” for iPhone 5, substantiates the earlier observation by several resellers who pointed out that there was a considerable lag time in getting access to the iPhones.

With Foxconn’s Hon Hai unit apparently struggling to manufacture enough iPhone 5 units to meet the massive demand, some of the problems seemingly stem from the difficulties in producing the handsets in large numbers because of Apple’s “quality standards” on its newest iPhone.

Noting that the Hon Hai unit is finding it difficult to come up to the quality standards laid down by Apple for iPhone 5, Gou told the reporters that while the market demand for the handset is “very strong,” Foxconn is unable to “really fulfill Apple’s requests.”

Though Gou warned that Foxconn is currently not able to get enough iPhones into the channel, he refrained from offering any comment on brokerage reports which said that Foxconn’s other unit, Foxconn International Holdings, had taken on part of the iPhone 5 production.