That sentence is because in engineering journals you often need to state some problem you are solving. Proving the problem exists isn't necessary, just enough to convince the editor. Most academics don't care if someone uses the technology, just like most software engineers don't care about the user of their product.

Yes it's the same reason in grad school they taught us to write grant proposals that cure diseases of senators and congresspeople, while actually working on fundamental research problems that have no direct applicability.