With industry watchers buzzing about Google's own Android-based phone, supposedly to be called 'Nexus One,' for weeks, the official unveiling of the device appears to be round the corner - most likely at the January 5 "Android press gathering" that Google is hosting at its headquarters in Mountain View, California.

Despite the fact that Google employees have, of late, been flaunting the device round in San Francisco, and numerous specification and video demos of the phone having appeared on the scene, Google has refrained from mentioning Nexus One in its invitation for the forthcoming media event.

While in its invites for the 'invitation-only' event, which incidentally comes two days before the commencement of Las Vegas' Consumer Electronics Show, Google has only mentioned Android - the company's mobile operating system for phones, there are expectations galore that Nexus One will make an official appearance at the event.

Going by recent online leaks about the Nexus One specs, the GSM-device features a 3.7-inch AMOLED touchscreen; 5-megapixel camera; Wi-Fi connectivity; compass; and accelerometer; and runs Android 2.1 - the latest version of Google's Android OS.

Though Google has not officially commented about Nexus One thus far, an inadvertent confirmation of the device came from Bradley Horowitz, Google's VP of management. In reply to a question about his favorite feature on the Google phone, Horowitz said: "My favorite feature is having one. That's the cool part!"