Lord of Dorkness and I had a discussion about this and we both came to the same conclusion: in the world of 2047, why is there no mention of powered exoskeletons?

They are a huge area of research for military and civilian applications with multiple research prototypes (and a few commercially available ones). Hell, you can buy one (HAL-5 model from Japan) if you're so inclined. And the ones in the real world do enhance strength by quite a bit. Thirty plus years of research into high-strength artificial muscles should provide muscles that when combined with an exoskeleton will grant the wearer of said exo truly superhuman strength.

So my question is where are they? Were they never researched? Does no one use them?

And even if they aren't useful in combat, they still have uses in military logistics as well as civilian manual labor. And let's not forget the Rewalk exo for parapelgics.

You know, I had this same discussion with one of my editors on that. The answer is two-fold. The first answer is this: if we have them now, we aren't we using them? Because they're not commercially feasible. Same reason why we've had fuel cells since the 1960s, and close to sixty years later they're still not being used beyond the experimental stage: because it all depends on priorities and politics.

The AAGverse is meant to mirror the real world in many ways, both good and bad. Politics, as has been shown repeatedly, is definitely one of the bad parts. As a military vet and someone who currently works in government, I see how things that are useful and important get sidelined every day because of someone's personal biases. Such as that happened in the AAGverse.

Secondly, mobility gear/armor isn't always going to be practical. Light infantry might not wear them, but heavy infantry might. Special Ops definitely wouldn't in some instances, because they can't afford to have the systems break down during critical moments. Likewise, there might be points where it's just impractical to wear them: there have not been any large-scale battles that require militarized versions, the few situations where civilian uses have been presented also show that they would be unweildy and/or awkward.

That being said:

“Well, we’re here,” a new voice said as a group of ponies walked into the area. Unlike normal ponies, they walked upright like humans, the better to utilize their weapons if need be. Wearing camouflage, body armor, helmets, and boots to assist in the upright mobility, the squad walked into view, looking around as if ready for an attack at any moment. Their leader, in particular, had eyes of steel, the muscular body of a behemoth and a take-no-shit attitude. “What’s the sit, Lady Knight Fluttershy?”

I never said they weren't present.

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Also, the AAG canon has established that treatments go all the way to nerve regeneration and vat-grown tissues, so medical exoskeletons, or even simple robotic prosthetics, would be very seldom seen. Besides, have you been watching the state of the art of biotech as of this year? As those things are going, I wouldn't doubt that the elderly could wear augmentations under loose clothing by 2025.

And for civilian applications of exoskeletons? Who would bother to pay expensive equipment to make a human pick up and be clumsy under a load of a half ton, when they could hire an Earth pony and only pay his salary?

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I'm pretty sure that's a subject brought up in Deus Ex: Human Revolution