Some days, it feels like I can't move for people telling me that printing companies need to become marketing communications services providers, or some equally snappy definition.

Sure, some of them do. Some of them are already. But I don't believe it's a strategy that can be adopted as some sort of universal magic bullet. The future shape of the industry will involve more than one model. Yesterday I visited a printing company that is becoming the embodiment of one such model, the industrial, high-volume business described in an earlier piece on this topic.

Westend Druckereibetriebe is part of WKS Druck Holdings, a print group formed by a German consolidation play. Its whole business model is based on critical mass and optimum fill for its web presses. As a result, it works on the basis of having sufficient work in the pipeline to fill 130-140% of its capacity, so its presses are always running and it puts the overspill out to the trade.

I visited the company as part of a workshop organised by MIS supplier Dims!. Westend has adopted the firm's system, and the implementation of a sophisticated MIS has transformed the way it operates, allowing the firm to maximise productivity and provide transparency of information.

Built in 1957, the Westend factory is one of the oldest print factories in Germany, but with some of the most modern kit. Managing director Dr Ralph Dittmann explained that in the past, just a handful of highly-experienced estimators and schedulers had all the necessary know-how, and changing job orders or finding out about jobs in progress involved a great deal of 'management by running about'. Now this information is displayed in the Dims! screens dotted around the facility and is available for everybody, from sales, to admin, to the shopfloor.

A typical Westend job might involve 24m versioned retail leaflets for a particular client per week. "We go from white paper to finished product in four seconds. Nothing else. Then the product is put on the lorry and into the distribution chain," says Dittman.

By optimising its MIS and workflow it is now producing more with eight web presses than it did with 12. His ambition is to grow this consolidation platform and add more production sites, but with the same IT and MIS structure and number of admin personnel. The management at Westend have understood perfectly what the right IT can bring to their business.

This type of technology isn't just limited to enormous, high-volume printers of course. Small and nimble printcos will also take advantage of what smart systems can do for their companies.

So. The printer of the future might be an MCSP, they might be industrial, they might be tiny, but what they will definitely be is IT-savvy.