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Apple designs and develops products vertically from chips, boards, devices, OS, applications to entire ecosystems for music, video, applications, payment, etc..
The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. They are leaps and bounds beyond silicon vendors such as Qualcomm, Intel, Broadcom, Mediatek, etc..
Because even in the 80's and 90's when Windows/Intel platforms were the industry standard, Apple had a hard core subset of followers who appreciated design over speed/trendiness. The fact that most hackers didn't bother with Apple systems because there weren't as many software programs for financial applications for Apple products at that time, and consequently less profit in it for the hackers, probably helped. The iPod, iPhone, and iPad, with their exclusive applications controlled by Apple, turned the rest of the market. The major difference, IMO, is that Qualcomm doesn't provide exclusive access to anything that a large segment of end-users want. They make chips for cell phones and similar devices that only manufacturers of devices are interested in purchasing, and then only if the chips have the best performance/price ratio when compared to similar chips. The average consumer has no clue what differences exist between competing chips. They DO care if the phone syncs with their iPod.