The publisher says the five-year agreement, signed on 1 September by Elsevier and the DEAL operating entity, MPDL Services GmbH (MPDLS), is set to run until the end of 2028 and is designed to make a large part of German research openly accessible worldwide.
Elsevier says the agreement, forged through collaboration and mutual understanding, supports the transition to open access in Germany, enabling researchers to publish open access and read content across Elsevier’s portfolio of scientific journals including brands such as Cell Press and The Lancet, while meeting DEAL’s objectives of affordability and sustainability.
Under the terms of the agreement, the publisher says authors from participating institutions can publish their articles in Elsevier's journals with immediate open access based on a per-article fee charged to their institution, enabling researchers around the world to access and benefit from their results. In addition, institutions will receive discounts on the list prices for their researchers' publications in fully open access Elsevier journals. Participating institutions will also have reading access to virtually the entire portfolio of Elsevier journals on ScienceDirect, a platform dedicated to peer-reviewed primary scientific and medical research.
The transformative agreement is designed to offer good value to the German research community. Institutions will soon be invited to participate in order to bring it into effect, added the publisher.
Prof. Günter M. Ziegler, president of Freie Universität Berlin and DEALs lead negotiator, said: “We believe that this agreement is a significant step forward for the scientific community and demonstrates that positive change can be achieved through persistent effort and a shared commitment to open science. By working together, we can further advance the principles of transparency, accessibility and collaboration that underpin the pursuit of knowledge. The agreement fulfils the key objectives set out by the Alliance of Science Organizations in Germany for the DEAL negotiations in enabling open access publishing and reading across Elsevier’s portfolio. This agreement will substantially enhance the global visibility of Germany's cutting-edge research while promoting open access to publicly funded science.”
Kumsal Bayazit, CEO of Elsevier, remarked: “We are very pleased to be able to support German researchers to publish their research with immediate open access in Elsevier’s journals. The DEAL Consortium and Elsevier worked together collaboratively and pragmatically to support Germany’s world-leading academic and science organizations achieve their research goals for the benefit of society. Elsevier is committed to continue to support our customers to achieve their objectives.”
Dr. Frank Sander, managing director at MPDLS, said: “This agreement is the result of the collective commitment of all German higher education, research and research infrastructure organizations acting jointly through MPDL Services gGmbH. Reflecting our shared vision for an open and affordable system of scholarly communication that maximizes the impact of research, the agreement provides DEAL institutions with cost-effective open access publishing and reading services, and we are delighted to support them in implementing the agreement to extend these benefits to scholars and scientists across the German research landscape.”
Elsevier says the agreement as well as further information on its terms and conditions and the sign-up process, can be found here.
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