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They could, if they wanted to. This is somewhat an example of "if it isn't broken, don't fix it".
A lot of that is the fact that Linux is run incredibly lean. Replicating that isn't cheap. They absolutely can, but since Linux is free and they can even modify it to suit their needs, its far simpler to do that.
Android is the best example. Google wanted a phone OS, so they bought Android Inc, who was making one. They could've spun up their own with their own talent, hired more, etc, but just absorbed one instead. That talent was making a phone OS based on Linux, because, again, they could've delved into the details of OS creation, but it was far easier to take a free OS, change the bits you want changed (like adding touchscreen support, which to my knowledge, wasn't in the Linux version Android started with), and run with the new version you've made.
It's also worth pointing out that Google has spent a lot of money on Android, and other large companies spend a lot on developing their own custom Linux Distro. It's not like they have one software engineer for Android who downloaded Linux once and changed it. These companies are willing to do what you describe, they just didn't have to reinvent the wheel. The Linux kernel, thanks to the community behind it, is incredibly secure and efficient, and there just wasn't any reason to change it or copy it when it exists and is free to use.