It's hard to imagine this is really Intel's fault and not just Tim Cook looking at a multi-billion dollar per year expense as an opportunity - they buy like 20

It's hard to imagine this is really Intel's fault and not just Tim Cook looking at a multi-billion dollar per year expense as an opportunity - they buy like 20 million processors a year it's a ton of money even by Apple's standards. Even Intel's lacklustre results in recent years seem like an unlikely catalyst - Apple couldn't have foreseen 14nm++++++++++++ back in 2015. In 2008 though, Apple acquired PA Semi to design chips. This project has probably been percolating since shortly after that.