This is simply not true. I work with quite a few of these reasonably qualified electronic engineers, EE's and managers who all love how fast we can turn out pro

This is simply not true. I work with quite a few of these reasonably qualified electronic engineers, EE's and managers who all love how fast we can turn out prototypes and concepts using the Arduino platform. True that the platform itself does not go into commercial designs, but the ATMega168 and 328 chips certainly do and priced quite competitively at quantity.