Perhaps for software development, but not for product development. Often as or more important to a product is finding out how it works for real users, and rapidly prototyping and disseminating builds is a good way to do that.

While software engineering is hard as a discipline, I don't feel it is the hardest part of building a startup.

On the other hand, for Android it's far easier to get your app running on the device itself. The only thing you have to do is to connect the device to your computer and click Run in the IDE. Beginners can get something up and running within minutes, which includes the time to download the IDE and create a Hello World. The whole workflow runs well, as you get the logs in your IDE or whatever and you can do debugging and so on and it's really not that bad, given that no simulator can match an actual device - there's something to be said about keeping the phone in your hand, rotating it at will and touching it to see how the app feels.

Apple's provisioning process on the other hand is the most painful thing I ever experienced.