When you walk into the Dusseldorf Messe, nothing will quite prepare you for the awesome scale of the exhibition. Across 17 halls, which are the size of several football fields themselves, the sheer breadth and height of technological innovation is quite simply stunning.

Staggering in from the airport on Saturday afternoon I rushed to an interview with EFI's chief executive officer Guy Gecht, who was positively buoyant about his company's efforts and Drupa. The company has an impressive compliment of machines on stand from the gargantuan Vutek GS5000R, through its new label printing Jetrion technology, to the capabilities of its new ceramic tile printing wing following the purchase of Cretaprint.

"The show is outstanding and reminds me why we like Drupa, one thing is that you see a lot of customers from all over the world and is an opportunity to sell into different markets like no other," Gecht told Print Monthly.

I then asked him what EFI has done to create such success, when many of its starting contemporaries are facing such difficulties, his reply was characteristically candid: "We had the luxury of facing a near death about ten years ago and designed the company then to focus on the area of growth for our customers and areas of increased efficiency. And because we focus on these areas people are now coming to talk to us, this is because they want to transform their business in the same way that EFI transformed."

The highlight today was going to visit the Landa stand, (Hall 9, A73), which features all of its latest 'Nano Printing Technology'. Its range of machines have set Twitter ablaze today, with almost every trade journalist paying homage to what the company has achieved.

Each model (S5, S7, S10, W5, W10, W50) features a large touch sensitive video control wall, which allows every nuance of the printer to be tweaked, checked and adjusted for what the organisation commented was, 'output as close to perfection as it is likely to come'.

Indeed, while many stands started to see visitors begin to tail off after 3pm, the Landa stand still had hordes of admiring on-lookers. You may well be thinking, ' so what's the catch?'. Well, speaking to several well-weathered industry heavy-weights, who shall remain nameless, there is some trepidation. The feeling is that although what Landa has achieved with this series is both beautiful and a tribute to the technological height of printing technology, the worry is that in a contracting market place—where price is increasingly becoming king—perhaps it will be to late for such expensive machines to be commercially viable when they become available in 18 months time.

Judgment on this issue will have to be reserved. But until then it really is worth a look—the image that struck me more than anything was an exhibit on the stand, which entailed eight open wall ink reservoirs. Showcasing eight vivid colour options, I watched as the ink mesmerisingly spiraled in centrifuges above some space age canisters, it had me thinking I was in a modern art-exhibition or NASA, rather than at a print show.

Anther important discovery on this, day four of Drupa, was the might that the wide-format digital printer manufacturers have brought to bear for the show. Never before has there been a stronger presence—this really does drive home the fact that the trend of commercial printers moving into wide-format and challenging sign and graphics businesses is accelerating fast.

This is an observation which Mimaki's European marketing manger Mike Horsten confirmed: "Mimaki has been very dominant went it comes to the sign and graphics market because we have been there for many years and continue to come up with new and innovative products. But we also know that the commercial graphics market is changing and becoming more of a one-stop-shop. This is why we have developed our new JFX500 flatbed, as at 60sq m/hr and with really high quality print, and is proof that commercial printing is being adopted by Mimaki."

Another highlight of today was a visit to the Duplo stand, as the company has brought almost its full arsenal to bear on Drupa. The company's marketing manager Andy Pike stated that sales have been more impressive than a recession hamstrung Drupa 2008 and also that there move towards broadening their digital print portfolio is bearing dividends.

"The big news for us is our new DMBI saddle stitcher, we have three versions on the stand, a digital version, a traditional litho version and a hybrid that can fit in most markets. As run lengths are reducing, this fulfills the need for automation and the need for sixty second make ready. But also this product offers A4 landscape capability and all the research shows that this market is growing for printing," Duplo UK's managing director Tony Lock told Print Monthly.

Our final port of call was at Surrey-based Technifold's stand, which has unveiled the soon to be commercially available CreaseStream Auto—capable of micro-perforating 12,000 sheets an hour without fiber cracking—the new machine has been under development for two years and reportedly fills a 'growing gap in the market place'.

"For us Drupa is an opportunity not just to meet and greet our customers, but importantly also distributors. We have formulated a new relationship with Technifold, which have been around for about 12 years now and are well known for eliminating the fiber cracking on printed stock. But a few years ago Technifold took the step to develop a machine to go around the tools. That has now grown further and together we are producing machines that are really proving very successful for us," says Mark Jarvis, sales executive at CreaseStream.

With three machine sales in the bag just while I was at the stand, Drupa 2012 does indeed seem to be living up to its reputation. Indeed, Graham Harris, celebrated inventor and managing director of Technifold, explained that the quality of visitors to Drupa has been impressive. One gentleman from as far afield as Mexico invested in the new CreaseStream Auto.

A final gem for you to look out for is Canadian wide-format flatbed printer manufacturer Gandy Digital. I stopped to talk to its enigmatic president and company namesake James Gandy, who outlined that his platforms are part of a new growth strategy for the company—focusing on ultra-high quality output for the commercial print sector to capture the same market share that Mimaki's Horsten identified. The machines certainly look the part, with one passer-by commenting they were 'the sexiest printers he had ever seen'—although perhaps he should get out more—and from the visible output they also walk-the-walk.