I had a coworker who worked on the haptic trackpad for 4 years before he left Apple and they shipped it a year after that (so at least 6 years or so of R&D), I'

I had a coworker who worked on the haptic trackpad for 4 years before he left Apple and they shipped it a year after that (so at least 6 years or so of R&D), I'm sure there are dozens of patents around the technology and probably a high barrier for entry for other companies. He griped that they didn't even send him the 12" MacBook it initially shipped in and that the R&D for it was ring fenced from the Mac hardware teams so both were working in isolation until the product was developed with the tech.