If you read the announcement that cancelled the Model 997 and announced the Model 998, they made the following statement:

"With this new product, we will implement Trinnov so that it works the way it is meant to be used - and heard!"

The Model 997 was to be based on the Sherwood R-972, but Outlaw cancelled it because it didn't do what they wanted from it. Was it because the Trinnov implementation didn't achieve what the technology is capable of? Was it due to reliability of hardware samples? Was it due to bugs? I don't know, but Outlaw decided to pursue the Model 997 long before a production sample of the R-972 was available to test-drive.