I think we very often confuse engineers with scientists in this field. Think of the old joke: “anyone can build a bridge, it takes an Engineer to build one that barely stands”. Business value and the goal of engineering is to make a bridge that is fast to build, cheap to make, and stays standing exactly as long as it needs to. This is very different from the goals of science which are to test the absolute limits of known performance.

What I read from GP is that they’re looking for engineering innovation, not new science. I don’t see it as contradictory at all.