There's an ongoing debate about the printing company of the future, and what said company may or may not look like. To my mind there is no one size fits all shape for this mythical business. Recent news from the high-volume end of print production does, however, provide some clues about the direction that particular part of the industry is heading.

Some of the planet's very large print companies are pushing forward a strategy whereby they will only take on contract work of known volume, format and duration at some of their plants. This, of course, allows them to plan their own production activities to the nth degree in order to maximise unit cost efficiency and, dare I say it, a known level of profitability. And, of course, cashflow.

There are echoes of this in last week's news from Polestar, which is cutting capacity and 'editing' its portfolio of work to jettison unprofitable or unacceptably low margin jobs. The end result, according to chief executive Barry Hibbert, will mean that just shy of 80% of the group's capacity will be tied up in contracts.

This isn't something new, I can think of some large German printcos who've operated like this for years. But its more widespread adoption has significant implications for clients who've enjoyed an enormous level of flexibility in the recent past. The Polestar news is an important heads-up about a new era where flexibility will need to be replaced by far more forward planning.