[2022] Factorio Expansion theory

This is by no means news, and is not confirmed anywhere. This is a simple wild speculation.

I have a fairly long commute to and from work, and sometimes factorio comes to mind. Given all the limited information that we have I am wondering if the devs are working on making factorio - biter version. Yes this has been done by the mod "hivemind" but hivemind is horribly balanced and almost always results in a biter win. We know that they need a stand alone game, that can be played as a separate entity from factorio, but also must be fully compatible with the base game. The screenshot the devs released of the new alien / bug could be the bitter equivalent of the engineer. it would require the creation of an alien tech tree, a new resource method of gathering for the bugs, as well as new units / buildings to construct and place. And either a way of automating a factory being built (looking at Josef). Or a fully only multiplayer mode

Again, just too much time to think, so this could be horribly off the mark.