Since 2016 the German Rectors' Conference has been negotiating on behalf of the Alliance of Science Organisations in Germany with the major publishing houses Wiley, Springer and Elsevier on a transformation model for publishing in journals. The aim is to introduce a nation-wide "Publish and Read" model that includes an open access component (publish) in addition to the access to the publishers' entire e-journal portfolio (read).

Aims of the Project DEAL

• articles of authors of German academic institutions will be published open access by default
• permanent access to full texts of the entire e-journal portfolio of the respective publisher
• reasonable costs according to a simple and future-oriented calculation model that is based on the publication volume of the respective institution

Project DEAL and Wiley

In January 2019, the DEAL project consortium signed a contract with Wiley based on the publish-and-read model. For authors of participating institutions (including AWI, GFZ, RIFS, PIK), this contract includes publication in original open access journals without individual invoicing as of 22 January 2019, as well as authorisation for hybrid open access publishing as of 1 July 2019.

More on the DEAL agreement with Wiley, publication processes and invoicing details

Project DEAL and Springer Nature

One year later, in January 2020, the world's most comprehensive open access transformation contract was signed with Springer Nature. This will enable the authors of the German institutions participating in the DEAL contract (including AWI, GFZ, RIFS, PIK) to publish openly in approx. 1,900 subscription journals and 600 open access journals, as well as full text access to current volumes and free backfile access to the journal portfolio up to 1997.

More on the DEAL agreement with Springer Nature, publication processes and invoicing details