SPIE Achieves Carbon Zero Printing with Toshiba Managed Document Services

SPIE is a leading UK building services and facilities management company with a history stretching back to 1848. Operating from a branch network spanning Edinburgh, Glasgow, Darlington, Manchester, Birmingham, Solihull, London, Heathrow, Bristol, and Cardiff, the company provides multi-technical and support services from mechanical and electrical design through to long-term maintenance and facilities management.

The Challenge

SPIE was facing escalating costs from its existing print fleet at a time when document volumes were increasing across the business. Drawings, bid documents, and reports were being produced at scale, and the complexity of managing these documents was growing.

A particular complication was the number of project sites that change on a regular basis. Construction and FM businesses cannot afford a rigid print infrastructure — they need a solution that can be deployed, moved, and reconfigured quickly as projects start, finish, and relocate.

The Solution

Toshiba Managed Document Services (MDS) was brought in to take full responsibility for SPIE’s print facilities across its entire portfolio of fixed and project sites.

The project began with detailed assessments and a series of stakeholder interviews across different departments, enabling Toshiba to map critical documents, processes, and usage patterns. From this intelligence, a bespoke corporate print policy was developed alongside a clear implementation plan.

Toshiba recommended a mix of monochrome and colour e-STUDIO MFPs, wide-format printers, and supporting software solutions. PaperCut was deployed to track usage patterns and manage cost recovery, giving management visibility of who is printing what, and enabling accurate cross-charging between departments and projects.

The devices were also configured with Toshiba Re-Rite OCR software, which converts scanned hard copies into a range of electronic formats — making it faster, easier, and more accurate to digitise paper-based documents.

The Results

Operational costs fell as a direct result of the usage tracking and reporting provided by PaperCut. For the first time, SPIE could monitor print behaviour at an individual and departmental level, and manage cost recovery from printing and copying with precision.

The Re-Rite OCR capability streamlined the handling of paper documents, converting them into searchable digital files that can be stored, shared, and retrieved far more efficiently than their physical equivalents.

The entire print operation now runs as a carbon zero environment through Toshiba’s Carbon Zero scheme. Paul Smith-Allen, Head of IT, described it as refreshing to work with a company that shares their determination to reduce carbon emissions. He praised the Carbon Zero initiative as making an environmentally friendly print operation possible.

The flexibility of the Toshiba MDS model means the service scales with the business — new project sites can be equipped quickly, and equipment is redeployed as requirements change. The success of the partnership led SPIE to extend the agreement to its sister company, SPIE WHS.