TU9 Universities Strengthen Open Access Publishing DEAL agreements with Elsevier, Springer Nature and Wiley promote Open Access publishing and free access to TU9 publications

The TU9 universities are unanimously joining all three DEAL agreements. The alliance, which also includes TU Braunschweig, is thus strengthening the establishment of Open Access publishing as the standard publication channel for researchers and free access to research articles. All TU members now have full access to Elsevier journals. In 2022, researchers from the nine Universities of Technology will publish around 20 per cent of all articles originating in Germany in Elsevier journals and, together with Springer Nature and Wiley, will account for a significant proportion of the publishing volume of these publishers in Germany.

As a result of the DEAL negotiations in 2023, three agreements have now been concluded with publishers Elsevier, Springer Nature and Wiley for the years 2024 to 2028. All three agreements enable researchers to publish Open Access articles in the respective journal portfolio and also include comprehensive reading rights. On behalf of the Alliance of German Science Organisations, the German Rectors’ Conference (HRK) has been negotiating with the three largest scientific publishers since 2014 and has now concluded the German Open Access agreements.

“By joining the DEAL agreements, our researchers will publish their research results as Open Access articles to an even greater extent in the future. This will significantly increase the global visibility of excellent research at the TU9 universities,” said the TU9 Co-Presidents, Professor Dr. Tanja Brühl, President of TU Darmstadt, and Professor Dr. Angela Ittel, President of TU Braunschweig.

Full access to Elsevier journals again

In line with the European Council, the TU9 universities also aim to promote Diamond Open Access by operating and developing publication infrastructures that meet the needs of different scientific disciplines. This will provide researchers with attractive alternatives to profit-oriented commercial publishing venues, without compromising on quality assurance and appropriate reputation metrics. “We are delighted to be able to offer members of TU Braunschweig full access to Elsevier journals again after years without a contract. We are also increasing the visibility of publications by making them Open Access and developing alternatives to commercial offerings by setting up Diamond Open Access infrastructures,” said Robert Strötgen, Director of Braunschweig University Library.