I’d read recently that Yamaha will be focusing on all hardware while Steinberg will be focusing solely on the software side of things. Already like the look of the new Yamaha CC1 controller - well thought out and build quality looks good.
I hope some day that Yamaha bring out a revised and improved version of the AXR4 series in some form. I know it had its glitches (enough for me to not buy one based on the feedback here) and was ditched by steinberg after a dissapointingly short time but there was clearly a huge amount of R&D that went into it, and its obviously built to a high audio standard - and it sounds incredible. Better than any other high end interfaces out there in my opinion. I think an updated version with focus on stability and a fluent workflow could be a success some day if done right (if they could shake of the bad taste of the AXR4’s short life span). Hopefully Yamaha are looking at the designs and figuring out a comeback…