Seems like there was a marketing decision made to make the official BT sourcebooks (of which there are many) the only way to tell any stories in the Jihad era, and that includes the Clan Homeworlds shenanigans (Wars of Reaving, et. al.).
That doesn't begin to accurately describe the licensing mess after FASA withdrew in 2001 and BattleTech was split into MechWarrior: Dark Age (MWDA) and Classic BattleTech (CBT). Pushing the Jihad timeline ahead in sourcebook format (as opposed to novels) was born out of need, as the least-bad choice, more than it was a "marketing decision". It was sourcebooks or nothing. At least that's how I understand the situation (corrections welcome, if anyone has better information):
Roc Books, who had the novel rights, decided to terminate the classic novel line after Endgame. (It's probably worth mentioning that the next universe-shaking spine novel,
Shadows of Faith, was already being written at the time so it may be assumed this was an unilateral decision by Roc.) From the context of how things played out, Roc then apparently sat on the novel rights doing nothing and thus effectively blocked novels for several years until their license ran out.
WizKids, who got the BT game license from FASA, opted to push the MWDA line really hard with a new MWDA novel line set in the distant future (3130+). Fans seem to agree that most of the early installments of that line were some of the worst BattleTech fiction ever published in an official capacity. They got their act together eventually, and after a rough start produced some really good books in the MWDA line. Until the print line stopped (again).
A Bonfire of Worlds, the final MWDA novel, was in limbo for many years before it finally got an electronic release. The promised print release didn't happen.
Meanwhile FanPro, who got the CBT license from WizKids, weren't allowed to publish content beyond the year 3067 because WizKids feared they might create inconsistencies with their (WizKids') MWDA future. FanPro also continued to publish original BattleTech novels set primarily in the Star League and late Succession Wars eras. They had (or so I was told) something of a falling-out with IMR over wether they even had the rights to publish new original novels, and stopped in 2008.
Author Loren Coleman and others meanwhile created InMedaRes (IMR) and launched the BattleCorps subscription website, initially with a license to publish (only) official BattleTech short fiction of up to 40,000 words, but at some point the wordcount was apparently dropped.
IMR is also the parent company of the Catalyst Game Labs imprint who would later take over the full BattleTech license after FanPro's CBT license expired in 2007. By that time MWDA was dead or dying, and the BattleTech brand was reunited while CGL (staffed by essentially the same people who had previously worked on the MWDA timeline) began to expand "classic" BattleTech through the Jihad, so as to re-connect the timelines. They didn't have the print novel rights at that point though, only what BattleCorps had as a subsciption-based service, and thus was born the idea to tell the Jihad in a chaotic "as it happened" style through sourcebooks, complete with misinformation and shennanigans. I personally enjoyed it as a fresh approach, but many other fans apparently hated it.
CGL is now slowly crawling out of that hole again and tipping their toes in print and PoD novels, initially with standalone pieces, anthologies and successful BattleCorps novels. They are re-focusing on fiction, which is a very good move imho, and PoD may be the solution to some of the problems that hampered print novel production. Things are definitely getting better.
