Open Access publishing options expanded: University of Erfurt joins DEAL agreement with Elsevier

Of the open access transformation agreements concluded with the three major academic publishers Elsevier, Springer Nature and Wiley under the auspices of the German Rectors' Conference, the University of Erfurt has already participated in the agreements with Springer and Wiley since 2024. As a result of an evaluation of the first two years of the agreement and a new cost analysis by the University Library, the University will also join the agreement with the publisher Elsevier on 1 January 2026.

In addition to reading access to the more than 2,600 journals in the publisher's portfolio, the contract offers simplified options for publishing open access with Elsevier. The new cost model introduced with the DEAL contracts comes into play here, according to which the total costs for the University of Erfurt are also based solely on the number of publications per contract year.

The following points are important for publishing in Elsevier journals:

• In those journals that do not work entirely according to the Open Access model (Hybrid Open Access), all publications with a corresponding author from the University of Erfurt are assigned to us on the basis of the affiliation and e-mail address provided upon submission. No further action is then required on the part of the publisher. The University Library bears the article costs via the participation fees. It is important to note that an obligation to pay costs remains in place even if publishers decline the Open Access option (opt-out).
• A special pricing model applies to the Elsevier journals of the Cell Press and The Lancet brands. Here, the fees charged to us for articles in hybrid open access journals are very high at EUR 7,464 per publication.
• For publications in journals that already work entirely according to the Open Access model (Fully Gold Open Access), a discount of 20 % on the publication fee is granted as part of the DEAL agreement. For the Fully Gold journals of Cell Press and The Lancet, the discount is reduced to 15 %.

The costs for the publication of articles in the Fully Gold journals are invoiced to the university in addition to the participation fees.

In order for publications to be correctly assigned to the new agreement, publishers must select the University of Erfurt as their institution as Corresponding Author during the submission process. All articles published Open Access are then subject to a legally compliant Creative Commons licence, which allows free reuse while maintaining the citation obligation. The CC-BY licence type should preferably be selected.

Further information can be found on the University Library website:

https://www.uni-erfurt.de/bibliothek/forschen-und-publizieren/publizieren-1/verlagsvereinbarungen

The Publication Management/Electronic Text Centre ETC team at the University Library is also happy to provide individual advice: