I'm sorry, biomech, how do you figure we waited till the last second to announce we're going to be late? We announced it a full month before deadline. We didn't hit the deadline and string people along with nonsense. We absolutely should have announced it sooner. We absolutely did not wait till the last second.
It is my understanding that from tapeout to receiving packaged chips averages about five weeks. This means that you (as in your team, not necessarily you personally) were aware on or about December 15th that you would be unable to hit the target.
Note that I am not an engineer, but that seems to be the consensus from the engineers I know as well as a number of sources on the web.