From what I've heard myself in the past, I don't think Qualcomm is as far behind as you say, but I would not be surprised if it was.
This puts me in mind of one time that I was ranting to a Microsoft colleague over lunch about how MS shouldn't be exclusive with Qualcomm for ARM chips given the very low rewards over the years. They said to me that when Windows Phone 7 first was under development in 2008-2010, choosing Qualcomm exclusivity seemed best because Qualcomm was the only one willing to make decent BSPs for us at Microsoft.
Upon reflection, I realized that this was still the case as of our conversation years later. The Mediateks, Samsungs, and Nvidias of the world either did not work with Microsoft at all, or got spurned by Microsoft themselves, or gave up after 1 or 2 high-profile failures (such as Surface RT). Texas Instruments was a notable exception as they gave up on ARM SoCs altogether, thus killing what would have become a TI-based Windows RT tablet platform.
Now neither me nor my coworker was in a position to actually know what was going on here, but I think this anecdote illustrates the value of a trustworthy business partner even when their products look mediocre.
And the 64bit ARM Apple chip surprised even ARM themselves. As ARM didn't even have a reference Cortex design out when Apple shipped their first 64 bit SoC. ( Apple was part of early member programme ) And no one thought they will need 64bit so early. ( Which was also true at the time ).
Qualcomm has to optimise for cost, for the same Die Space Qualcomm already includes a Modem, while Apple has Modem as separate pcs of silicon. It isn't Qualcomm is technically subpar, they just have different objective and goals. And vendors are already calling foul for Qualcomm's continue increase in price. ( Which is actually normal due to the complexity of 5G, CPU, GPU and leading edge node development )
This puts me in mind of one time that I was ranting to a Microsoft colleague over lunch about how MS shouldn't be exclusive with Qualcomm for ARM chips given the very low rewards over the years. They said to me that when Windows Phone 7 first was under development in 2008-2010, choosing Qualcomm exclusivity seemed best because Qualcomm was the only one willing to make decent BSPs for us at Microsoft.
Upon reflection, I realized that this was still the case as of our conversation years later. The Mediateks, Samsungs, and Nvidias of the world either did not work with Microsoft at all, or got spurned by Microsoft themselves, or gave up after 1 or 2 high-profile failures (such as Surface RT). Texas Instruments was a notable exception as they gave up on ARM SoCs altogether, thus killing what would have become a TI-based Windows RT tablet platform.
Now neither me nor my coworker was in a position to actually know what was going on here, but I think this anecdote illustrates the value of a trustworthy business partner even when their products look mediocre.