April 8, 2004 -- The cream of industry and educational knowledge will be gathered and hosted by PrintCity in a highly convenient “Intelligence Centre”, situated in PrintCity’s Hall 6 at the drupa 2004 exhibition in Düsseldorf. Containing booths for a number of internationally-renowned industry associations and education institutions, the Intelligence Centre will act as an ideal single meeting place and forum for drupa visitors to connect with these organisations, and discuss industry issues and initiatives. Trade bodies Ifra, the Paper and Related Industries Marketing Association (PRIMA), the World Association of Newspapers (WAN) and the Web Offset Champion Group, will be joined in the Intelligence Centre by Manchester Business School, Hochschule der Medien (HdM) from Stuttgart, Hochschule für Technik, Wirtschaft und Kultur (HTWK) in Leipzig, and Fachhochschule München from Munich. PrintCity works alongside all of these organisations, such as in the launch at Ifra in 2003 of the graphic arts industry’s first dedicated distance-learning MBA programme, which has been created and is administered in association with Manchester Business School and HdM. The first intake of students begin this programme in July 2004. Helmut J. Dangelmaier, President of PrintCity, explained that the Intelligence Centre had been conceived to make contacting these organisations a far simpler task within the drupa environment. “This will be my tenth drupa, and at every previous one I’ve had to walk from one end of the exhibition complex to the other for back-to-back meetings, sometimes involving a 20 minute walk. While it may have kept me fit, it has always been very inconvenient and wasted valuable time. “PrintCity here presents a practical solution. By putting a large number of industry associations in such close proximity it’s easier to forge closer ties, and to benefit from having a single focus point for all this graphic arts brain power. Visitors can conduct their meetings at the Intelligence Centre, and then it’s just a short walk across Hall 6 to see PrintCity’s ground-breaking “PrintWorks” live factory environment. “I, for one, will certainly take advantage of the facilities and knowledge in the Intelligence Centre, and I have a strong feeling that by the end of drupa I won’t be the only person giving thanks for such an industry gathering.”