I think a lot of that decisive lead had more to do with what Apple was willing to spend time/money on and others weren't (rather than what was or wasn't possibl

I think a lot of that decisive lead had more to do with what Apple was willing to spend time/money on and others weren't (rather than what was or wasn't possible for any major OEM to do). The combination of camera hardware improving across the board and continuing consumer focus on this as a selling point can only lead Google and others to start putting out better cameras if people are using that as a deciding factor in what phone they buy.