Yeah its a neat little phone Apple came to Verizon first but we rejected it due to Apple wanting control over those customers with the phone.
Which is what you have to look foward to if you do get that phone (Example: If there is something wrong with the phone you can't just go into a store and have it looked at and or replaced if you need it to be. You have to ship the phone back to Apple ect ect)
But you already know other companies are working on a similar phone I know for a fact Samsung and LG are so I'm sure all the other carriers will have a similar phone shortly..