UKB consortium signs new deals for access to scientific journals and open access publishing

Early 2022, the UKB consortium renewed a number of 'read and publish' contracts with major publishers. Through these deals, the Dutch university community and the academic hospitals have access to many thousands of scientific journals, as well as the right to publish open access in the journals for which licenses have been agreed upon at no extra cost. This makes the results of scientific research accessible to everyone worldwide without barriers.

The new contracts at a glance:

• American Chemical Society (ACS): Access to 65 scientific journals in which also can be published in open access. The full open access journals are no longer part of the deal. Each year, a maximum of 544 articles can be published open access by the joint universities. The contract runs until the end of 2025.
• Brill: In addition to access to approximately 300 journals, it is also possible to publish in open access in these journals at no extra cost. This also applies to the fully open access journals of this publisher. The deal has been concluded for three years and will run until 2024.
• IOS Press: This read and publish deal, that includes full open access journals, has been extended by one year under the same conditions.
• Karger: Corresponding authors from 11 Dutch universities can publish open access in all 89 journals of this publisher at no extra cost. This applies to both hybrid and fully open access journals. The deal has been concluded for three years.
• Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC): Access to about 40 journals, in which corresponding authors from Dutch universities and UMC’s can publish open access at no extra cost. The deal is valid from 2022 to 2024.
• Sage: There is a new deal that runs until 2024. Corresponding authors can publish in over 900 hybrid journals at no extra cost. Sage also publishes over 170 open access journals. Dutch scientific authors receive a 20% discount on the Article Processing Charge.
• Springer: The contract with this publisher has been extended by one year, with an option for another year. It includes access to around 2.000 journals and open access publication rights up to yearly 2.080 articles.
• Thieme: The contract, which runs until the end of 2024, provides access to almost 100 scientific journals in which open access can be published.

A so-called Subscribe to Open (S2O) deal has been concluded with Amsterdam University Press (AUP). In the coming years, the transition will gradually be made from the subscription model to open access publishing without paying Article Processing Charges (APCs).

Negotiations for a consortium deal with the American Institute of Physics (AIP) are currently being translated into a contract.

With the British Medical Journal (BMJ), only a read deal has been agreed. Open access publishing is no longer part of this.

More information

Detailed information on all 'read & pubish' agreements can be found at openaccess.nl, where the contracts themselves will also be published. The new deals are also registered in the European register ESAC. The journalbrowser gives an overview per journal of the possibilities to publish in open access. Not only for the journals in the above deals. You can also find information on the agreements made with other scientific publishers and the publication possibilities with fully open access publishers.

For questions about these deals and open access publishing in general, please contact the contact persons within the universities.