Hi Who42
I've already seen this design type in bigger BLDC (automotive) to achive highest Power/size ratio which is needed for highspeed cars like Lotus Lightning GT. Problem with all hub motors is it unsprung mass. Even with the big advantage of direct drive (active steering) 1/2/3/4 wheel drive, redundancy, recuperation) it's quite uncommonly used in cars (which are the "driving motor" of BLDCs atm).
The MP3 already weights 6,5kg compared to about 78% efficiency; BionX can get 76% by 3,2kg weight. Putting much more rare earth and copper (they could use aluminium coils as well and safe weight) into the outer rim gives torque, but centrifugal mass makes it very difficult to accelerate/decelerate. The torque is atm a problem for all bike fork manufacturer already as you can see in my posts about forks...
And I have not seen anything innovative from mass manufacturing. LRK Motors (like the Bionx or SP, MP1/2/3 from GM) are quite old in invention (around 1990), but needed 10 years before it was used to the availability of hi capacity/longevity accu's.
Another interesting motortype is the Trans Flux Motor which has an efficiency around 85-90% without adding additional weight, just thestructure is much more work intensive and the electronic quite fast which limits it's use to big & high power like Transrapid railway.
Best wishes
SAm