> slowing down customer-purchased devices before pushing new devices to the market.

This is wrong. Apple pushed out a fix that when the phone detects it has crashed due to the soc getting undervolted, they would limit the maximum cpu frequency to avoid the phone having future power failures. This is absolutely what the user wants. There is no point getting full cpu speed if it means the phone just reboots when you use it.

Where they failed was in communication. They should have signalled to the user that this has happened and that they should replace the battery. They now do this and have a whole battery health page.

Communication is a massive problem for megacorps because everything (usually rightfully) becomes a huge deal. But id not be so quick to jump to malice as an explanation.