Having worked on enterprise APs using BCM and Atheros chipsets: The driver is not deeply protected IP. They will hand out full copies to any device manufacture

Having worked on enterprise APs using BCM and Atheros chipsets: The driver is not deeply protected IP. They will hand out full copies to any device manufacturer that uses they're chipset, so that they can integrate it with their systems. The secret sauce, the bit that they won't share with anyone even if it's necessary for debugging, is the on-chip firmware. That's the stuff they take seriously. The driver itself is just a lawyer thing.