Threadmarked for Apocrypha.
During the time the Necrontyr got their cybernetic immortality they weren't either. They were banished back to their immediate home region of space for poking the old ones the wrong way, and being all round imperialistic self entitled stupid noble pricks.
Also, while i agree that Emps may have pushed a few things about humanity's digitalization, i still think that the Necrontyr were piss poor software engineers, and still are because even as they have achieved mechanical apotheosis, they still have not managed to rewrite any part of their coding, escaped the confines of their bodies through uploading (with the sole exception of Trazyn) and are suffering from so many errors and glitches that its stopped being sad and revolved into humor.
And furthermore, as they cannot do any of those things, they cannot create a neural network of nanites to upload their minds into and then install this mass of nanites into an organic slurry and have it grow! They are abysmally terrible software engineers and biologists. At least they are decent engineers and superb physicists.