My job was and art director, pre-press  training and coordinated oversea between Thai Designer team and USA Printer.

They used to have to delivered  a hard dive to a printer and rip every single page at print shop
 for 2 resons.
1.The files was huge, 1 gigabyte per page.
2. Thai spelling correction. If something wrong, a production artist have to fixed on site.

They use to spend more than 6 hours for pre-press.

After I created PDF pre-press method by output pages into .pdf format . The design group in Thailand can upload .pdf files directed to the USA printer. for 2 resons..
1.The PDF files was reduce to 1-2 Megabyte per page, easy to upload.
2.PDF file is true "What you see is what you get". They can directly upload to print shop server and automatic rip.
The result is cut pre-press time and cost to zero and 99% accurate .