Australia Post rival Digital Post has committed to launching its Digital Postbox service in February 2013, after a private testing phase that kicked off on August 20.
The rival services have been racing for what analysts have forecast to be a $138 million digital mail market, wooing banks, utilities and share registries as launch partners.
Digital Post chief executive officer Randy Dean previously stated that the Digital Postbox would launch within the 2012 calendar year.
But joint parent company Computershare told investors last week that the service would launch in February, with a public "soft launch" slated for this month.
Dean declined to identify Digital Post's private testing participants but said the trial had won "very positive feedback from both businesses and consumers" involved.
"The service is quite ready to go from a technical perspective," Dean told iTnews.
"Our marketing activities and plans are confidential for competitive reasons but as you would be aware, the holiday season makes it difficult to get the attention of consumers, which is playing a role in the timing."
Australia Post launched its Digital MailBox service on October 30 to meet a previously announced launch date but pulled the registration page offline within days due to technical issues.
The registration page has since been restored but Australia Post has declined to provide screenshots or access to the service so far.
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