I see apple as like LVMH, but for phones. It has a minority of overall sales, but a majority of the “luxury” part of the market. This gives them influence over the whole market, but not a real monopoly.
Of all the things they do, that is not one of them. How long does it take from pressing a folder to showing its contents on iOS? How much faster would all of it be without a fancy fade in/out animation? or shrink to dock, or anything else in the UI that takes longer than it has to because it looks cooler that way.