The Venmo team is a different team, located in NYC instead of California, has a brand that people actually like, something something middle managers. This kind of nonsense is standard issue from eBay and I don't think it would have changed in a month of separation.
Venmo has a team in SF now, and eBay doesn't own PayPal anymore.
Personally, I think it makes a lot of sense. This seems like a lower-friction flow, especially when requesting money from people who have never heard of Venmo – not everyone trust a payment processor they've never heard of, and PayPal has much broader awareness than Venmo.
