Indeed, the XLR8 and other Software work well with almost every aftermarket G3/G4 upgrade. Regarding the IP infringement - that was much disputed as there are not so many ways how to enable the cache. No matter what, that was not the reason why Met@box exited the market.
Short story: I´ve started with them (at that time they were called PIOS) in 1996 as the "Mac" man while the other staff was focused on CHRP and a new Amiga successor based on basically the same dual 603e CHRP design - sans Apple-specific chips. But they needed cash and thus, we started with clone manufacturing (Keenya -> Tanzania based, Magna -> Storm Surge based) in parallel. Then in 1997, we created a Mach 5 (604r) CPU card for Tsunami/TNT etc. with up to 350Mhz (up to 400Mhz in the lab) and started selling the card as well as the Clones equipped with either our own card or newertech 604 and later G3 cards. But the Clone days were over at the latest in 1998 when the last boards were sold and the Amiga clone was still a prototype - however, one that made the switch from dual 603e to single G3. In the meantime, Pios both changed name and directions. Pios got Met@box and the new focus was to build set-top boxes and create an ecosystem around them. They had a clever technology called BOT (broadcast on television) that used the blanking on the TV signal to send data to the set-top boxes - slow, but 24/7. An editorial team created a web experience with news and entertainment (Met@TV) and only when you want to retrieve stuff that wasn´t on the 500mb HD of the box, you had to use a dial-up connection to connect to the internet. In the meantime, Thomas and I moved from the Mach 5 to G3 and later G4 to create CPU upgrade cards. We later moved to ZIF and L2 upgrades. In the early beginning, we were quite competitive and innovative with bus-speed and delay switches, but later towards the late 90s and early 2000, the majority of the RnD power went into a new project called Phoenix. Hopes were that the successor (based on Motorola Cold Fire CPUs and a dedicated OS) of the initial two boxes would be the breakthrough. However, the Phoenix box or Met@box 1000 never made it to the market. At this time (2000), the german Met@box set up a US subsidiary. Based on the fact that the Met@box C-Level was based on Ex Erikkson/Ex Commodore-Amiga staff, they had good relations to the US. Two main developers of the original Amiga were also involved in the Pios/Met@box Amiga Clones and later the Phoenix. But, the joeCARD and the little brother, the littleJoe (my name is J. from Johann - short: Joe. My co-developer´s and my name are silkscreened on the StorSurge CPU littleJoe and joeCARD) were quite expensive for the US market. No wonder, as we bought CPUs and Cache Ram in the US, imported them to Germany, manufactured here and then sold to the US. In addition, the margin was always kept quite high as the Phoenix RnD needed cash flow (and more investments from investors) and the overhead in the company increased week by week. That staff needed to be paid. We were less than 10 guys 1996 and ended up with more than 200 just a couple of years later. However, the Mac Devision sales dwindled down as there was no more RnD. We never brought the Alchemy/Gazelle L2 Card to the market and our Sawtooth and later G4 upgrades newver made it past the prototype workbench. All we did was live on heritage and there was still some hope by the Amiga guys to get the next amiga ready and that Phoenix will save us all - Phoenix from ashes.....
In 2001, the new stock market overheated and the company was listed on this stock market since its inception. The climate got rougher and after some bad news regarding mismanagement, constant losses and obviously fraudulent ad hoc news, the stock collapsed. The prosecution followed suit and in 2001, the company went bankrupt.