If anything, as for moving forward (time wise), they're narrowing focus as opposed to expanding. They bought the whole thing and then made the conscious choice to say screw the OT frankly. We'll kill them all off and give them crappy post ROTJ lives and now we're free and done with them. Seemed no care there whatsoever. No one said they had to feature, but not treated poorly and not killed off purely for the sake of killing them off.
Another aspect is the rumor that RJ's trilogy is going to be set during the OT, but just elsewhere. That's not really expanding things.
Expansion would be going way back - or way forward. Simply doing something else that's not tied to anything that exists really.
I don't begrudge R1 or Solo in the slightest, or the forthcoming Obi Wan film. But expansion isn't going that. R1 a bit, yes. R1 did expand on the OT. And while I don't bregrudge solo or obi, those aren't expanding things. They're not expanding the universe, they're just telling us more about what we already know (not that there's necessarily anything wrong with that).
The intent of the comment would seem to be 'it's a whole galaxy'. It's huge, but we've seen a tiny part. Things happened for thousands of years, and we've cover a miniscule amount of it. Expand your horizons. Do things no attached to anything existing whatsoever - hence way before E1 or way after E9 (or 12 or whatever).
I think that's fair, although I haven't heard anything to suggest Rian's working in the OT era and I am inclined to think he's is not. Also, I don't think the GOT guys are going to the OT either. The OT era may continue to harbor Story Films for the time being but there are 6 new potential films that I think will move into very new era's.