The article mentions why Apple is the best: unbeatable hardware. It's that simple really...
With smartphones, sure, there are other companies that are pushing technology forward (Sumsung's Galaxy phones are often beyond what an iPhone can offer), but with Apple, I don't have to worry about hardware failing (walk into the neares Apple store, get it fixed/replaced), and I don't need to worry about the software not being updated anytime soon (I can't trust Samsung any more with their updates, and even Nexus 4, Google's flagship phone released in 2012, stopped receiving updates more than a year ago - compared with iPhone 5, also released in 2012, that's still updated today).