Collective Pathway to Open Publishing combines funding from OA agreements and reading access to convert journals to open access

Taylor & Francis has confirmed both journals in its innovative pilot, Collective Pathway to Open Publishing (CPOP), will be converted to open access (OA) for 2025.

Announced in November 2024, CPOP has been devised as an alternative OA model for Humanities and Social Sciences (HSS) journals, particularly those focused on regions with a high uptake of OA agreements.

With funding thresholds met for the pilot, every article in the 2025 volumes of Nordic Psychology and Nordic Social Work Research will now be published OA at no cost to authors. This includes all specialist and professional content, a key feature of HSS journals that is not usually included in OA agreements.

The CPOP model combines several existing funding sources to support the conversion of journals to OA, one volume at a time. Institutions participating in Taylor & Francis’ OA agreements fund publishing for their affiliated authors, accounting for a high percentage of articles in the Nordic pilot journals. In addition, continued support from a small group of institutions with subscriptions and other read access is used for the remaining new articles.

This collective approach enables all articles to be published OA, regardless of whether the authors have funding or are affiliated with an institution in an OA agreement.

Emily Farrell, Global Commercial Director for Open Research at Taylor & Francis, said: “The move to a fully open future is going to require a mix of different models, given the varying levels of funding available for OA publishing across regions and disciplines. We’re therefore delighted at the success of CPOP’s experimental approach to supporting OA conversions. Thank you to all those institutions, particularly in the Nordic countries, who have collectively made this possible by renewing their read agreement or approving articles through their open access agreement”.

CPOP is one of several pathways being created by Taylor & Francis to accelerate OA publishing. Earlier this month the publisher also announced the results of its Subscribe to Open pilot, confirming that all three of the pilot journals will be fully open access throughout 2025.

Global healthcare knowledge provider, BMJ Group, is expanding its open access reach by introducing new and renewed Read and Publish agreements for 2025, further reinforcing its ongoing support for enhancing global knowledge sharing. With agreements now spanning the Americas, Australia, and Europe, these partnerships enable researchers to publish their work openly, reaching a broader audience and amplifying the impact of their research.

BMJ Group’s Read and Publish agreements now encompass over 200 institutions worldwide. In 2024, publishing output through these agreements increased by 212% compared to 2021, demonstrating the growing global demand for sustainable open access publishing models. 

These agreements also provide access to the Group’s full journal collection of over 65 titles, some of which are the most influential in their field. These agreements also provide access to the Group’s full journal collection of over 65 titles, some of which are the most influential in their field. These agreements also provide access to the Group’s complete journal collection of over 65 titles, some of which are the most influential in their field. 

UK and Ireland—BMJ Group has renewed its Read and Publish agreements with JISC in the UK and the Irish Research e-Library (IReL)—a consortium of Irish research libraries—for the fifth consecutive year. This year’s agreements continue with a “Publish” element covering the entire BMJ Journals Collection, giving researchers at over 75 institutions the opportunity to publish open access across the full range of the Group’s titles. These long-standing partnerships continue to support the transition to open access, enhancing global access to critical healthcare research.

Europe—BMJ Group has expanded its reach with renewed agreements in Hungary and Austria. The partnerships with the Hungarian Electronic Information Services National Programme (EiSZ) in Hungary and E-Media Austria Cooperation (KEMO) in Austria allow researchers at participating institutions to publish open access across the full BMJ Journals Collection. BMJ Group has also renewed agreements with major European consortia, including Bayern Konsortium (BSB, Germany), the National Library of Sweden (Bibsam), and the Consortium of Swiss Academic Libraries (CSAL, Switzerland).

Australia—Having grown from one institutional agreement in 2024 to four in 2025, BMJ Group is excited to see the rapid expansion of its partnerships in Australia. New agreements with the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, University of Notre Dame, University of New South Wales, and Edith Cowan University will support academic excellence and foster greater regional research collaboration. This expansion reflects the Group’s dedicated focus on increasing access to open access publishing opportunities for Australian researchers, empowering them to share their work on a global scale.

Americas—BMJ Group continues strengthening its presence in the United States with brand new Read and Publish agreements at the University of Arizona and Northeastern University. In addition, Vanderbilt University, Rowan University and Michigan State University have all renewed their existing agreements. These agreements enable researchers to publish open access across the BMJ Journals Collection, including The BMJ [Research]; and BMJ Gold open access journals, including BMJ Open. 

In Mexico, BMJ Group continues collaborating with the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). Our new 2025 Read and Publish Agreement covers publish and read access in the BMJ Journals Collection and our Gold open access journals.

ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery, the world’s largest computing society, has joined India’s One Nation One Subscription (ONOS) initiative through a transformative new read-and-publish agreement with the ACM Open program. This agreement provides 6,500 government-funded higher education and research institutions across India with Premium Access to the ACM Digital Library, while enabling authors in participating institutions to publish an unlimited number of Open Access research articles in ACM journals, ACM conference proceedings and ICPS Proceedings with no article processing charges (APCs).

This strategic agreement marks a major step in expanding access to global computing research across India, with nationwide access to the ACM Digital Library—the most comprehensive collection of published computing and information technology literature. It also enables authors at participating institutions to publish Open Access without APCs, significantly increasing the global visibility and reach of Indian research.

“The ONOS initiative is a bold step toward national research equity, and ACM is proud to be a part of this historic moment for India,” said Scott Delman, ACM’s Director of Publications. “We’ve long believed that computing research should be available to everyone, everywhere—and ONOS makes that vision a reality for one of the world’s most dynamic and fast-growing research communities.”

ONOS is enabled by the Information and Library Network (INFLIBNET), an initiative of the Indian government. Institutions across India will gain access to ACM’s full suite of research publications and tools—including more than 800,000 articles, advanced discovery features, the ACM Guide to Computing Literature, and research workflow support—through the Digital Library Premium.

By combining access and publishing into a single agreement, the ACM Open model removes cost barriers for Indian authors and increases the reach and readership of their work. Articles are made freely available worldwide upon publication, opening the door to greater collaboration and wider engagement across the global research community.

“India is a significant contributor to ACM’s publications and a vital part of the global computing research community,” said Delman. “Through ONOS, ACM is not only deepening its engagement with India—we’re helping ensure that groundbreaking research from every corner of the country reaches a global audience.”

Since its launch in late January 2020, more than 8,000 institutions worldwide decided to participate in the ACM OPEN license model. The newly signed agreement with ONOS continues ACM’s collaborative efforts towards making all of its content fully Open Access by the end of 2025.

The Biochemical Society and Vanderbilt University’s Jean and Alexander Heard Libraries are delighted to announce an open access agreement that supports the open sharing of research and knowledge from across the molecular biosciences.

The agreement guarantees uncapped, fee-free open access (OA) publishing for corresponding authors for Vanderbilt researchers, alongside full read access to all Biochemical Society journals (published by the Society’s publishing arm, Portland Press). 

In response to the announcement, Professor Nigel Hooper, Chair of Portland Press Board, said:

“We are extremely pleased to launch this agreement, which furthers the open access goals of both the Biochemical Society and Vanderbilt University in support of sustainable and equitable publishing models and open science. Most importantly, it offers all Vanderbilt researchers a fast, efficient and fee-free route to open access publishing. This offers the best means of maximising the dissemination and impact of their work in any one of the Society’s high-quality research or review journals. In addition, read access to the full archives of the portfolio further enhance the benefits of this agreement.”

Charles R. Sanders, vice dean of the Vanderbilt School of Medicine Basic Sciences, Aileen M. Lange and Annie Mary Lyle Chair in Cardiovascular Research, and professor of biochemistry, said: 

“Open access publishing agreements such as this are hugely helpful to our faculty and their research programs. Grant budgets are always very tight, so when faculty can save money by not having to pay publishing fees, they have more funds for doing research and supporting their teams.”

Vanderbilt University Librarian Jon Shaw said:

“This collaboration will help ensure that Vanderbilt’s preeminent research in the biosciences is more freely accessible to scholars, practitioners and communities worldwide. We are proud to partner with the Biochemical Society and Portland Press in this vital effort, which broadens the university’s global impact and connects its scholarship with researchers, policymakers and international audiences.”

Working with publishing representative, Accucoms, the parties have signed this agreement coming into effect immediately and benefitting the molecular biosciences field through greater dissemination of their research.

On the agreement, Ellen Endres, KGL Accucoms Regional Sales Manager in North America said: 

“We are thrilled to have facilitated this successful partnership between Vanderbilt University and the Biochemical Society/Portland Press to bring unrestricted, fee-free open access publishing to more researchers and to continue to eliminate barriers to OA publishing.”