I looked in to a bunch of options when deciding on a new ECU for my car, ultimately the idea of leaving the reliability of my vehicle up to a more complex stack

I looked in to a bunch of options when deciding on a new ECU for my car, ultimately the idea of leaving the reliability of my vehicle up to a more complex stack of software, with dependencies, updates and bugs within the layers beneath the ECU software itself, didn't feel like the right choice. I also really love that aftermarket ECU manufacturers have been able to find a market, and I wanted to support that. Almost all of the ECU companies I've been in contact with were started by one or two engineers as a commercial project for enthusiasts. You just don't see bread and butter circuitry and embedded software companies solving real problems like that getting a fair go in the market these days. It's a niche where talent makes your reputation, and it's not a space big enough to get "disrupted" by the Venture Capital bubble.