I'd need someone who wears a propeller on their head for a living to back my theory but I think that these new the development of these transmissions is being driven by emission standards as much as anything. Allowing computers to tightly control what the engine is doing given any speed, load or condition should help manage emissions and fuel economy and having lots of gear ratios to choose from should assist this. I've heard that one reason manual transmissions are becoming less available is that it's much more difficult to get them to pass emissions because there is no control over one critical aspect-the nut behind the wheel.
