Major Deals with Publishers

The EUA has published its survey of the major contracts concluded between consortia of (mainly) universities and libraries, but also governments and scientific organisations on the one hand, and the major publishers of scientific journals on the other. EUA asserts in the report that the total sum of money involved in these Big Deals with the publishers is over 420 million Euro, of which a huge share (over 380 million) goes to periodicals. EUA refers to recent studies that have estimated a 45% or 170 million euro saving by a full transition towards an open access publishing system. That is a lot of money, which could be re-allocated to research and/or to moving towards a full-scale open access publishing system.