As part of CES 2008, Bill Gates announced and Microsoft have published information about their development of Windows Mobile 7 which I must say seems to be very similar in feature set to that demonstrated by the iPhone.

According to the announcement, WinMob 7 will ship in 2009.
If WinMob 7 does end up offering the described features including touch and gesture recognition it will be a welcome addition and the competition between the various players in the mobile sector to improve user interfaces can only be a good thing for users.
The info can be found here:
http://microsoft.blognewschannel.com/archives/2008/01/06/exclusive-windows-mobile-7-to-focus-on-touch-and-motion-gestures/