This is not actually true, although it makes a good myth.
Android seems to have been targeting a variety of form factors from pre-iPhone times, and had a touchscreen interface implemented before Apple released the iPhone:
Android seems to have been targeting a variety of form factors from pre-iPhone times, and had a touchscreen interface implemented before Apple released the iPhone:
> Within weeks the Android team had completely reconfigured its objectives. A phone with a touchscreen, code-named Dream, that had been in the early stages of development, became the focus.
I'm not sure that I'd describe that as "The Day Google Had to 'Start Over' on Android".
Your link says November 12 2007 was when Google demoed a touchscreen phone.
The iphone was announced Jan 9, 2007, and went on sale Jun 29, 2007.
What calendar are you using where November is before June?
"But for the Google Android team, the iPhone was a kick in the stomach.
'What we had suddenly looked just so . . . nineties,' DeSalvo said. 'It’s just one of those things that are obvious when you see it.'"
Either the Android team already had something like the iPhone but it was so far out that it may as well not have existed or even their work on the touchscreen version was not nearly good enough to ship after the iPhone. I don't think you can read that passage and think that Google was ready with an iPhone like touchscreen design. Even their early touchscreen designs that I saw were still smallish screens with physical keyboards attached.
Android was clearly in a similar situation. (In fact, they were clearly playing catchup until at least Android 4.0). However, there was something working. The concept was there. A prototype implementation was there. The execution was not.