Perhaps. I would read the fine print before I took any of this money. Strings are assuredly going to be attached. I think Brin et al would save a lot of money by visiting a psychologist rather than hiring a team scientists a la some Bond villain.
IMO, all research funding dedicated to fundamentally understanding and eliminating/preventing degenerative diseases is a good thing; regardless of the egos involved.
I was under the impression that the initial explicit mission of Calico had nothing to with degenerative diseases and was simply about studying the "disease" of aging using genomics-like technology, so it's nice to see them change course and get real. I'm still skeptical about their approach, but they haven't elucidated much about that yet. I guess if you already can own a Porsche/Tesla by the age of 30, your mid-life crisis is gonna look pretty different from what mine will probably look like.