By 2025, Cambridge University Press plans to open access to all publications

Cambridge University Press, a British publisher of academic literature, has announced that it has opened access to half of its research papers. The publishing house announced this on its website.

Currently, 404 scientific journals are freely available: 66 with fully open access and 340 in a hybrid format.

Since 2022, more than 10,000 papers have been freely available, and by 2025, Cambridge University Press “is aiming for the vast majority of its research papers to be published fully open access each year.”

According to the publisher, open access articles that are available online through the Cambridge Core platform “receive about 3.5 times more full text views and on average 1.6 times more citations” compared to traditional subscription models where readers or their institutions pay to access research.

The publishing house will be able to publish its academic papers in open access by signing transformative agreements covering over 2,000 institutions worldwide, enabling researchers at these universities and research institutes to publish open research at no additional cost. Transformation agreements are made between publishers and institutions such as libraries and universities to “transform” the way content is paid for, including the shift from subscription-based business models to open access.

In the United States alone, Cambridge University Press has signed more than 300 such agreements over the past two years while developing its Cambridge Open Engage platform.

“As an academic publisher, we are committed to maximising the dissemination and impact of high-quality research and gold open access is a sustainable route to support that mission. […] Transformative agreements have provided an important route towards open access for all authors, irrespective of their funding. We are building on this momentum to exploring a range of business models to take us beyond the Transformative Agreement and establish innovations to ensure the world’s academics, students and citizens can enjoy open access in a sustainable manner,” said Mandy Hill, Managing Director, Academic, at Cambridge University Press & Assessment.

Cambridge University Press is a university press that is part of the University of Cambridge in England. It was founded in 1534 by King Henry VIII Tudor. Along with Oxford University Press, it is the second publishing house to have the status of privileged presses with the right to print the King James Bible.

As a reminder, in 2022, Ukrainian scientists received free access to electronic resources from the world’s leading countries.

Photo: twitter of the Cambridge University Press