what about the deal with sammy? they are still obligated to release that puppy and sell as many phones as possible. moto, htc, sammy... it really doesn't matter to vzw as long as you upgrade and ink that contract.
The idea is that there's more demand for the Galaxy Nexus than there is for the Rezound/Razr. True, VZN doesn't care as long as you sign up for a two year contract, but it's more complicated than that.
You have 1000 handsets of each phone. 500 sell of the Razr, 800 sell of the HTC, and 1000 (based on what I've seen) sell from the Nexus. Then what? As Verizon replenishes, you've got folks that are wanting the galaxy nexus that might either get the Razr, Rezound, or worst of all, completely jump ship and go to another carrier.
Here's where my argument can be refuted. I know this is kinda no duh but I'll mention it anyways. It seems as if the Razr, Rezound, and Nexus are aimed at different consumer groups. As someone mentioned before, the Rezound is aimed at regular folks who just want a smartphone. People see the beats brand and think "wow! free high end headphones! I should get that!" and end up getting the Rezound. Some people see the motocast, thinness, lightness, and cloud services of the Razr and end up grabbing that. Then there are the rabid "hardcore" Android folks who are going for the Nexus.
Verizon could very well release all three phones and not really experience that big of cannibalization (in the terms of handset supply) between the Razr, Rezound, and Nexus. The average consumer will look at hardware specs and see which is "bigger", and from a hardware perspective, may assume that since the Rezound has a bigger # processor (1.5 vs. 1.2), it's faster than the Nexus and Razr. Since the Razr has more megapixels, they'll assume that it has a better camera than the Nexus. In fact, if you read alot of blogs comparing the Razr and Nexus, some of them even state that the camera in the Razr is better than the Nexus (based solely on the fact that 8 > 5 for megapixels).
My point is that Verizon might be trying to target three different consumer groups. I even heard somewhere that the Razr had some business/enterprise-related functions built into it.
So in conclusion...this is POSITIVE evidence for a quicker release of the Nexus:
Razr: Sold to business professionals and folks that like motocast/Razr brand/"cloud" services
Rezound: Typical consumer that likes music/video and is drawn into the "beats audio" brand and free high end headphones.
Nexus: Hardcore Android folks that want the pure google experience.
Phew!