hi folks, Michael here from the Qubes OS project.
I was part of the original effort of talking with Purism to get their laptop certified. Since everyone has had some distance now, it is maybe good time to clarify what should be already pretty clear (see unman’s posts above).
First, the Qubes OS project is happy to currently have two manufacturers with certification. Certification is a well-thought-out process with benefits to the manufacturer and to the free-and-open-source Qubes OS project.
The current process makes clear the conditions for certification, in particular that the manufacturer offer to customers the same configuration for at least a year. This point was made explicit out of the experience with Purism and the Librem 13, which went through a number of hardware changes as the company worked to stabilize its laptop offering while at the same time already selling it to end-users.
Maintaining a hardware certification while changing the hardware is not possible, and troubleshooting and re-certifying each new hardware iteration was seen as cost-prohibitive to the Purism team, so they dropped seeking certification for their laptop.
I think for both projects it was a learning experience, and we wish the best to the Purism team.