Recognized as the official mouthpiece of the South African printing, packaging, signage, and visual communication industries and is consulted by Government and all other important national bodies. The operations are based nationally at four Regional Offices (Chambers).

The Print Production Directorate uses an in-house design and layout unit, large (A1) multi-colour printing presses and binding (finishing) equipment. Its core function was to design, print and bind study material items with bespoke design, layout, quantities and configurations for each module and academic level; examination scripts for all modules and academic levels with different quantities per module and level; short courses for twenty-two centres; and general printing administrative and commercial printing. Operational objectives included, ensuring that all orders were completed on time, in full, cost effectively, correct quantity, adhering to strict quality control metrics. Design and layout conformed to multiple output formats (print, pdf, xml). Total staff complement of 260.

Instrumental in ensuring students receive their study material on time and in full by overseeing three directorates, namely, Planning & Coordination, Print Production, Despatch across two sites. With a total staff complement of 560, the operations processed on average 14 000 study material line items (stock-keeping units) annually and services approximately 450 000 students globally. In addition, material is also produced for short course, general administrative and commercial printing, exam question paper printing and full mail house services

The Despatch Directorate receives, warehouses and distributes all study material items (14 000 SKUs) for Unisa and the Unisa School of Business Leadership (SBL). The mail processing unit packages, receives and distributes +/- 1 million general mail pieces per month to all regional offices countrywide from courier providers, the South African Post Office (SAPO) and inter-office mail. The operations are based at three separate locations in Gauteng with a staff complement of 190 permanent staff, 400 seasonal workers and a budget of R310m (Opex) R933k (Capex).