Looking forward for actual chapter but is this necessary?
Maybe they are going to start working on it, and don't want to let the work go to waste if another group starts it.
Happened to me quite a few times, as decided to do translation work for a few series (with help from MTL and my own understanding of Japanese). But as I get near the end of my work (which incidentally I do slowly, as I am lazy), someone else already had started working on it.
What's more, quite a few of those series were left untranslated for months or years, before i tried doing them, only to suddenly see someone else doing it.