When's the last time an I.P. Owner has sold the rights to their biggest franchise to another publisher??
Why would they be putting SNKP characters in Queens Gate, Lord of Vermillion, various MMORPGs, and make a mobile cell phone game, and their Pachi-slot games, in order to sell the rights to what they've so deeply seeded?
It seems much more likely that they're just building up funding, because they are a small group who can't just throw money around everywhere. So they're building up funds on inexpensive projects (SNK collections, VC releases, NesicaLIVE ports, etc), in order to do their next big thing.
They're quiet because tossing in any "small bone" of info could fall flat if released around a time when something greater overtakes it.
Plus, if their small team has work full sail on something else, they might not have the ability to produce marketing stuff up to the calibur they desire, for their biggest project.
Have we gotten spoiled by the quick-media info that the internet and connective tech provide now? There are loads of games that SHOULD have ports, from JP arcades, they oddly don't (just look at all the Gundam VS releases, Border Break, LoV, the Shining Force arcade game, VF5 Final, etc). This is a company that still acts as almost every else did 5 or 10 years ago.
I look forward to seeing if anything happens at E3, but I'm really not expecting it, now. But it'll be a plesant suprise if it DOES happen!
And an interesting interjection: Death Smile 2 is the first Xbox Digital Import Games on Demand release game (with no translation, to boot!). Sony has done similiar for a while, and Arcana Heart 3 was recently relesed that way. Maybe this is an avenue SNKP could take? DS2 wasn't announced to be doing this until 7 days or so before it actually came out, also.
There's so many possibilities...