Quote - That said, I think the Poser group may be reluctant to do it because developing a good versatile figure sounds like it's a huge investment to do.

It's not as huge of an investment as you might think. But that depends on what your definition of "huge" is.

Mostly it just takes finding the right talent, and paying them what that talent deserves to be paid. There are a lot of character artists out there who can sculpt a realistic figure that looks like a photo, no 3D scanners necessary. It's an art form just as anything else and some of those artists put everything they have into it. Rigging is another talent, as is understanding proper mesh construction for animation. These skills don't just come from playing around in apps like Wings. They have to be trained and the skills have to be honed. When you combine those 3 aspects into one team you can produce some pretty nice results. The trick is finding the right team and getting them to want to work for you, and with each other. 

Poser's figures have pretty much always been sourced from 3d party artists and companies, at least until around P8. I think that's when they started using in-house character artists.