The RTI team where developing for no money
R U shure about that? I'am not, you don't think RTI is writing drivers from nothing I guess

but opensat who collected money off the sale of STB's seem to have left them behind
Where do you think they get the drivers? You don't think RTI writes drivers from nothing

When was opensats last firmware update for older boxex
OFW firmware came from CELRUN ( not OpenSAT ) OpenSAT had a NDA (NON DISCLOSURE) agreement with CELRUN that was the only way to get the boxes on the market. As for now I don't know if that agreement has ended or still exists.
Fact is that CELRUN isn't producing new firmware's and Sigma isn't/wasn't cooperating that good with OpenSAT/CELRUN

Azbox models generated from a media/iptv model from CELRUN, there where multiple companies wich wanted too add DVB to that box finally OpenSAT got the deal with CELRUN so they could release Azbox under NDA agreement.
That meant that the software was entended to be closed source due to the NDA agreement.