As someone outside of the mobile phone industry (Just a simple consumer) I don't see the advantage of having a mobile phone service provider "committing" to your OS. Surely hardware manufacturers are vastly more important as they are the people who are actually going to create devices that can run your OS?
This is a consequence of commitments to a country's spectrum management organizations.
If an operator expresses commitment, I would take this is a very important initial step, but not necessarily an indicator of full blown embracement of a platform. Operators will schedule time for a device to go through their certification labs. This means that a device can get approval from the regional spectrum bodies for qualifications that ensure the device doesn't interfere with authorized spectrum devices. Lab certification is not free- the operators are eating a cost. But certainly it's not the same thing as buying pallets of devices and trying to sell them to consumers.
Last time, a year ago if memory serves, he also hinted that they were going to create an app store that will revolutionize Internet.
I'm not sure that those declarations had anything to do with FFOS. I don't care anyway. If Telefónica uses their huge physical stores chain and their terminals subside practices to promote FFOS, I'd be happy.