Springer Nature leads drive for Open Access across Europe with latest Transformative Agreement with Spain
Publisher holds the highest number of national transformative agreements in Europe enabling researchers from over 2,100 affiliated institutions to publish OA
London May 5, 2021
Since 2014, when Springer Nature pioneered its first transformative agreement (TA), the publisher has been leading the way enabling country level flips to open access (OA). Its latest national TA with Spain takes Springer Nature’s number of national TA’s to 14, 13 of which are in Europe. Through its TAs Springer Nature supports researchers from over 2,100 institutions, double that of any other publisher, in publishing OA.
This latest TA for Springer Nature, agreed with the Conference of Rectors of Spanish Universities (Crue Universidades Españolas) and the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), is a clear example of the publisher’s continued commitment to driving OA and enabling sustainable open science practices globally.
The agreement will enable the 58 affiliated Universities of Crue & CSIC, responsible for over 90% of scientific research production in Spain, to publish OA in Springer Nature’s portfolio of over 2,300 titles including the Adis titles. With their work freely and universally available from the point of publication, this agreement will further enable the world’s students, scholars and scientists to read, share, use and reuse Spanish-funded research on a global scale. Affiliated researchers from Crue & CSIC institutions will also have full access to all Springer and Adis subscription journal content. The agreement is expected to see over 2200 articles a year from researchers in Spain published OA, and will run for four years up to 31 December 2024.
Vice President of Crue, president of the Open Science Working Group and rector of the Polytechnic University of Valencia, Francisco Mora stated:
“This agreement consolidates a clear commitment by Spanish universities and of the CSIC for Free Access. The agreement with Springer Nature also confirms Crue's commitment to Open Science and, in this sense both researchers and Spanish citizens as a whole have more and more new resources to approach science without limitations and learn about its latest findings.
Research shows that TAs are the fastest way to enable the OA transition as they enable more authors to publish OA. This is because TA’s offer authors an easy way to comply with funders’ OA requirements whilst enabling participating institutions to better manage the cost and administration of OA by combining journal subscription (read) access along with OA publication costs (APCs). In countries where Springer Nature has a TA, up to 90% of Springer Nature content is now published via gold OA. Through its wider commitment to the principles and drive for open science, Springer Nature continues to enable a sustainable transition to OA for all authors regardless of discipline, location or funding. Springer Nature has in place more national TA’s than any other publisher, including the highest number of agreements within Europe and the world’s largest by volume of articles with Projekt DEAL in Germany.
Speaking of the agreement Dagmar Laging, Vice President, Institutional Sales Europe remarked:
“ TA’s are a key driver in the sustainable transition to OA. We remain focused on facilitating this transition for a growing number of institutions, supporting academic collaboration, discoverability and usability at scale. We are delighted to extend that commitment with our agreement with Crue & CSIC , better supporting Spanish researchers and their research outputs through the advancement of OA publishing. With our shared goal of driving open science through the sustainable promotion of open access to researchers, this deal deepens our commitment to a truly open future, one which we believe is key to advancing scientific discovery and delivering real life benefits for all.”
Vice President of Scientific and Technical Research of the CSIC, Jesús Marco, added:
“CSIC is firmly committed to the Open Science model by promoting open access to the results of the research carried out at this institution. This alliance represents a new step forward, a milestone in our strategy towards fulfilling that commitment. Fostering a diverse and plural open access publishing ecosystem is one of our objectives and we are very happy to have achieved it in alliance with the Conference of Rectors of Spanish Universities and Springer Nature.”
Driving the development of open science remains Springer Nature’s primary focus in serving the research community. More on the publisher’s TA’s can be found here. More on Springer Nature’s commitment to open science and its wider principles can be found here.
Springer Nature advances discovery by publishing robust and insightful research, supporting the development of new areas of knowledge, making ideas and information accessible around the world, and leading the way on open access. Key to this is our ability to provide the best possible service to the whole research community: helping authors to share their discoveries; enabling researchers to find, access and understand the work of others; supporting librarians and institutions with innovations in technology and data; and providing quality publishing support to societies.
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Crue Universidades Españolas is a non-profit association made up of a total of 76 Spanish universities: 50 public and 26 private. As the main interlocutor of the universities with the central government, it plays a key role in all regulatory developments that affect Higher Education in Spain. In addition, it promotes initiatives of various kinds to foster relations with the productive and social fabric, institutional relations, both national and international. In February 2019 it approved the document «Commitment of universities to Open Science», a Decalogue with concrete measures for the implementation of Open Science. www.crue.org
The CSIC is the largest public institution dedicated to research in Spain and the third in Europe. The CSIC is made up of 120 institutes (67 of its own and 53 joint institutions in collaboration with 43 public universities). The total staff, distributed among the institutes and the central services, amounts to just over 11,000 people, of which some 5,300 are directly dedicated to research, including permanent, contracted, trainee and trainee researchers. Belonging to the Ministry of Science and Innovation of Spain, the CSIC's main objective is to develop and promote research that contributes to the achievement of the country's scientific and technological objectives. www.csic.es
Katie Baker, Head of Communications - Research and Publishing Services
katie.baker@springernature.com
