That's all well and good in a world that's pure software (and that does happen in those environments). It's not realistic in a world with lead times on physical items that are at least 1 year. For example, if you want to set up a high volume manufacturing line for a new product that takes a lot of planning in advance. You need to spend 10s to 100s of millions of dollars on a contract and schedule with the manufacturer and you need to be able to have SOME indication of where in that process firmware might be released (or more realistically - given the timescale, what scope of software is possible).
I have been told that "as long as the firmware update on the device works, the rest of the firmware doesn't have to completely work until devices start getting shipped and installed." Yes, people are playing very dangerous games out there. :(
That's all well and good in a world that's pure software (and that does happen in those environments). It's not realistic in a world with lead times on physical items that are at least 1 year. For example, if you want to set up a high volume manufacturing line for a new product that takes a lot of planning in advance. You need to spend 10s to 100s of millions of dollars on a contract and schedule with the manufacturer and you need to be able to have SOME indication of where in that process firmware might be released (or more realistically - given the timescale, what scope of software is possible).