I'm a little confused, isn't QNX an operating system focused on embedded systems? I would expect it would probably lag behind in desktop apps because of focus and small user base.
It's a classical case of wrong expectations. The author criticizes QNX for not automatically installing a SMP kernel. That is actually a good thing as multiprocessor real-time systems are very much different from uniprocessor real-time systems. People building real-time systems should consciously choose to allow SMP; the OS shouldn't do it behind the scenes in a dot update.