You can almost get this on the iPhone by swiping to the left of the first home screen and using spotlight. I use that all the time, for contacts and to launch apps hidden in folders I rarely use.
In Android you could use the universal search widget and start typing, but it's just not the same. I don't regret giving up my Blackberry, but having the physical keyboard there definitely made a lot of interaction flows better (RIP Blackberry Bold 9000).
You can almost get this on the iPhone by swiping to the left of the first home screen and using spotlight. I use that all the time, for contacts and to launch apps hidden in folders I rarely use.