There are a few doom & gloom news articles out there right now talking about failure for the upcoming Windows Phone 7 operating system based on the news that only 3 companies will be releasing devices on launch day. LG, Samsung, and HTC will all have Windows Phone 7 devices available right away, however Dell’s rumored “Lightning” Windows Phone may take a while longer to finish. I suppose we might assume the Asus Windows Phones may not be available at launch either since they were not mentioned. Here’s a couple of the articles that are spelling doom for Microsoft because of this: Business Insider, TechEye.net The articles also mention that it’s bad news for Microsoft that HP is not developing a Windows Phone 7 device. Honestly, I don’t see that as such a big loss.

On the other hand, we’ve actually seen multiple Windows Phone 7 device leaks coming from each of Microsoft’s partners. It’s still not entirely clear as to exactly which devices will be released on which carriers in which countries and at which times, but it seems pretty clear that there will be plenty more than one Windows Phone 7 device to choose from when they’re ready for purchase.

Compare this to the launch selections of the other popular newly-developed smartphone operating systems around these days. Apple, of course, only had one phone to sell you at launch. Palm only had the Pre to show off their new Web OS on Sprint originally. Google had only the G1 on T-Mobile for a long time before anyone else released an Android device. Of course, today is a different story now that we see new Android phones every couple weeks.

Does the idea that Microsoft will definitely have more than one Windows Phone 7 device available at launch give you a little more confidence in the newborn operating system? Or does Microsoft really need more than 3 launch partners right off the bat in order to have any chance at competing?