It’s not just TSMC - they also have a very good CPU team giving AMD heartburn even when you compare the chips on the same TSMC process, and they have the part which is hardest to match: they control the OS, compilers, libraries, and key apps. That allows them to ensure that hardware acceleration is actually used, tailor chips for the power and usage patterns their devices need, and avoid the conflicts of interest inherent to multi-vendor systems because they share responsibility for a great device and profits aren’t unevenly distributed. That’s not perfect and they’re certainly in a bad place if they misjudge but it’s worked so far.
