The Google Nexus 6 release date is likely to come in September 2014, at the latest, as Motorola confirmed this week that a Moto X refresh is definitely arriving late summer this year, new reports said.

According Android Central, Motorola Mobility tweeted on Feb 25 that the second Moto X is touching down in time for the hottest months of the year or summer and the ETA is likely late in the season or between late August and early September 2014.

In a Q&A thread on Twitter, when the Moto X maker was asked when the next version is set to land this year, the company simply replied: "Keep posted - hint - late summer."

The declaration ended there but almost immediately, speculations fly out and one of them is the likelihood that right after the Moto X debut, the 2014 Nexus smartphone will be outed by Google - that is if the Motorola device will end up as the Nexus 6 base model.

The idea is not far-fetched at all as Motorola is soon to be a device brand under the wings of Chinese PC maker Lenovo. Pending finalisation of the $3 billion deal between and Google and Lenovo, the Moto X maker is set to change ownership again and according to analysts, the agreement will be formalised later in the year.

Given that, Lenovo-Motorola has become a solid candidate to manufacture the Nexus 6 as Google will become part-owner of Motorola and makes business sense to keep the Nexus 2014 smartphone project in-house.

Analysts also believe that in passing the Nexus phone torch to Lenovo, Google is gaining strategic advantage over its rivals - foremost of which are Apple and Samsung, which are set to release the iPhone 6 and Galaxy S5 (already out) respectively this year.

With the Nexus 6 carrying the Motorola branding (under Lenovo's stewardship, of course), Google is somehow assured of a wider market reach for the vanilla Android smartphone as Lenovo is an established brand name in China.

And in the event that Motorola is confirmed as the Nexus 6 maker, Android watchers automatically look to the next Moto X as the possible template.

However, South Korea's LG remain in the running with the company's latest smartphone, the LG G Pro 2, emerging as the Nexus 6 candidate. There are talks too that the upcoming LG G3 is under consideration.

At any rate, the Nexus 6 release date can be expected within the third quarter of 2014 though a preview of the handset could be allowed in late June via the I/O Developers Conference. Confirmed specs and features so far are an 8-core 64-bit Snapdragon 810 chip and Android 4.5 or Lollipop.