Take IPhone chargers for example. There are hundreds of companies in the marketing making simple and cheap IPhone Wireless chargers, some of which are actually better than the cables sold by Apple themselves…. How are they all able to make the same product when patents exist? Does Apple have the patent to the lighting connector and if so why is it not enforced?
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Patents only apply in the country they are issued.
A lot of electronic accessories are manufactured in countries that the patent either doesn’t apply in, or they don’t care.
China for example is notorious for lax patent and copyright law when it comes to protecting the interest of Chinese companies.
Such unlicensed products are theoretically stopped at the border to prevent them from being sold in US stores, thus enforcing the patent, but a lot gets through with private and online sellers.
That being said, the majority of Lightning Connector accessories are in fact licensed products. The companies that make them pay Apple a royalty fee for each product sold.
That’s why Apple resisted so hard against the laws mandating USB-C because they wouldn’t get paid royalties for accessories if they use the open standard.
This is also why the European Union passed that law, to stop this exact kind of anti-consumer behavior
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