Sure, Apple has more than enough to acquire many small companies but they don’t even have to use their cash for that. It’s pretty much impossible (especially with the revenue and profit Apple is seeing) to chip away those billions with small acquisitions, no matter the number.

Apple would have to spend that money on a huge acquisition. Huge. And most of those seem to fail. Also, all the interesting targets I can think of (e.g. carriers) don’t seem like a particularly good match for Apple for various reason (regulatory, politically, competitively).