Gabe Newell knows that any potential buyer will run Valve into the ground. Thus he already promised too long ago that he would never sell or let Valve go public.
Considering how many game studios that Microsoft just killed off in the last 3 years alone; they’re never going to be worthy of buying Valve.
I like that he is being decisive about it. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that the feature was only being delayed because of internal project politics or quirky policies that normally make sense, but don’t in this specific scenario.