I'd actually argue that ROM is still expensive unless you are making a lot of units, and it's been pretty much replaced everywhere by flash which can be commoditised leading to better economies of scale as well as having the advantage that your "ROM" can be upgraded without wasting a lot of old stock.
Where hardcoded ROMs do exist in designs now, it's usually still as a glorified stage 1 bootloader, albeit now usually with signature checking as well.
Where hardcoded ROMs do exist in designs now, it's usually still as a glorified stage 1 bootloader, albeit now usually with signature checking as well.