What does the fox say?

Caroline SuttonPublisher/Co-Founder Co-action Publishing

COASP 2013, 18-20 Sept. 2013, Riga

A bit about Co-Action Publishing Established as Swedish limited liability company in 2007

by three former executives from academic publishing industry

Affiliate office in Norway

Founding Member Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association, OASPA, current President

Publish journals across disciplines, including Social Sciences and the Humanities, but primarily medicine

7 employees; publishing 36 journals

Business philosophy & culture based on Swedish values

Copernicus

PLoS

BMC

Hindawi Publishing

Scientific Publishing

MedKnow

Few competitors◦Branding important but less important than

today.◦Simply being an OA publisher was distinctive.

On the other hand, communications were very important.

In the form of advocacy (education) Focused primarily on defining things like green

vs. Gold OA. Dispelling myths and correcting inaccurate or false information.

To build a market. Very useful to cooperate with other publishers

and to point to their good work. – OASPA!

Established OA publishers New pure OA publishers Mega journals and mega projects University library hosting and publishing

services Small OA publishers Legacy publishers with OA portfolios

Having a branding and communication strategy is now critical.

Differentiation Clearly define services Define Open Access at our company Price justification

”…a point publishers should be aware of in the coming Open Access era where individuals, not institutions, will control economic decision making power in the form of Article Processing Charges (APC). Authors will increasingly demand real service for their APCs, like any other product that you pay for as a lab manager. Publishers who do not deliver a good “product” in terms of doing their job in handling manuscripts, typesetting, hosting, etc. will find that they are now in a competitive market and authors who don’t get a good service will take their money elsewhere.”

For Co-Action Publishing advocacy work is still important as part of that strategy

In relation to social sciences & humanities In relation to societies To define nuances in Open Access

publishing (e.g. Licensing) To build support for different payment

models As part of positioning company

Also small publishers must be aware of current discourse and be prepared to respond to claims and actions of others.

Align with loud voices where/when we agree with them.

Engage locally where we can have a loud voice.

Think creatively to embrace small And embrace being a pure OA publisher

Thank you!

Caroline.Sutton@co-action.net