Elsevier and Jisc Sign UK Open Access Deal
The academic publisher Elsevier has agreed to a three-year "read and publish" agreement with Jisc, the negotiating body for UK academic institutions. The deal combines reading access to Elsevier's journals with open access publishing rights for UK researchers. This type of agreement is central to the ongoing shift towards open science in Europe.
- The previous multi-year "read and publish" agreement between Jisc and Elsevier ran from the beginning of 2022 to the end of 2024. That deal aimed to provide a 15% reduction on subscription spending while allowing authors from participating UK institutions to publish in Elsevier's hybrid journals without paying an Article Processing Charge (APC). - Such agreements are a direct response to "Plan S," an initiative by a consortium of European research funders (cOAlition S) requiring that scientific publications from research they fund be made immediately available in open access repositories or journals. - The push for open access has significantly shifted UK research publishing; in 2022, 56% of UK articles were published via the "gold" open access route, a steep increase from just 9% in 2012. - These "transformative agreements" have a measurable impact on the volume of open access research. A similar Jisc deal with publisher Taylor & Francis resulted in a 432% increase in open access articles and 16.2 million global downloads between 2020 and 2022. - While intended to control costs, the long-term financial sustainability of these large-scale agreements is a significant concern for universities. Jisc's negotiations in 2025 with the five largest academic publishers aimed to secure more affordable terms amid major financial pressures on the UK higher education sector. - The model is not without critics, who argue that "read and publish" deals can deepen global inequalities in scholarly publishing. The model may create a two-tier system where the ability to publish in prestigious journals is dependent on an author's affiliation with a well-funded institution in a wealthy country. - Under the terms of the previous deal, when a paper was accepted, the submitting author from a participating UK university was identified, and their institution validated their eligibility to have the open access publishing costs covered by the agreement. - These agreements are considered "transitional" as they are intended to gradually shift the business model of academic publishing from subscription-based access ("pay-to-read") to one based on open access publishing services ("pay-to-publish").
