The 10-colour B1 press will be delivered to the Telford business in July replacing a five-colour Mitsubishi that has output 20m sheets per annum.

Precision's new perfector press offers double the number of units of the outgoing Mitsubishi as well as single pass production.

It will run on a 12-hour day shift and used to print high volume colour work as well as short-run magazines in lengths up to 8,000.

According to Alex Evans, managing director of Precision Colour printing, the decision to invest in Heidelberg was because the manufacturer offered "a well established press that other users verify does what it says on the tin".

He added: "We handle about three multi-section magazines per shift so 25 makereadies per 24 hours would be quite normal.

"Inpress Control will allow us to get to print fast and to have reports of the colour control throughout the run, potentially eliminating the need for on-press passes, which will save our publishing customers time and money."

Precision Colour Printing employs 270 staff and is the commercial printing arm of newspaper, commercial print and publishing software business, The Claverley Group.

Precision, which has a turnover of £32m, specialises in business to business magazines as well as serving print management companies and direct mail clients.

Commenting its latest investment, Evans said: "It’s a press that will help us reduce overheads and increase profit.

"We will use this press primarily for high volume cover work and short run magazines with grammages most often of 80 to 100gsm but ranging from 65 to 130gsm on occasion."