Yeah if it really means both markets by Oct. at the latest, then it's not that bad after all, I always felt June/July was a bit too ambitious/unrealistic anyway.
Availability in Oct. means they'll have their phone out at more-or-less the same time as Canonical*, & Canonical's 1st device is a low-end one, so they won't be competing directly.
Plus they'll be able to recoup some momentum they lost to Ubuntu**, thanks to their device being more appealing than Canonical's low-end affair...

*assuming Canonical's recent claims aren't a bit overly ambitious, which I suspect are
**because of it's ability to leverage existing high-end Android devices