PLOS and OA Switchboard Announce Partnership

Note: PLOS issued the following press release on July, 22, 2022.

SAN FRANCISCO —The Public Library of Science (PLOS) and the OA Switchboard today announced a partnership that will enable PLOS to better manage its Open Access publishing agreements with institutions, while also providing greater transparency and metadata to our stakeholders, including consortia, libraries and funders.

PLOS was part of the founding working group that sought to tackle the challenge of supporting funder policies, realizing agreements and developing new business models to support a broader move to Open Access (OA) publishing, and the result was the OA Switchboard which was launched in 2020 by the Open Access Scholarly Publishing Association (OASPA) to serve OA publishers, research institutions and funders alike.

“Our organization is an independent and industry-wide initiative that provides a central hub for stakeholders to exchange OA-related publication-level information,” said Yvonne Campfens, Executive Director, OA Switchboard. “We are excited that PLOS is now connected to the practical tool that they’ve helped shaping, as PLOS recognized the importance of a community-led collaborative initiative from day 1.”

“The standardization between systems, portals and processes that the OA Switchboard provides will allow PLOS to share increasingly valuable reporting and data analysis with our institutional partners,” said Randy Townsend, Director of Publishing Operations, PLOS. “We are excited to enhance transparency in OA publishing with the ability to immediately share article metadata directly, upon publication, with our community.”

PLOS has recently launched five new journals and we are not yet done. The integration of the OA Switchboard into our workflows is scalable for all our new and legacy journals.

About the Public Library of Science

PLOS is a nonprofit, open access publisher empowering researchers to accelerate progress in science and medicine by leading a transformation in research communication. Since our founding in 2001, PLOS journals have helped break boundaries in research communication to provide more opportunities, choice, and context for researchers and readers. For more information, visit http://www.plos.org.

About the OA Switchboard

A global not-for-profit and independent intermediary established in 2020, the OA Switchboard provides a central hub for research funders, institutions and publishers to exchange OA-related publication-level information. Connecting parties and systems, and streamlining communication and the neutral exchange of metadata, the OA Switchboard provides direct, indirect and community benefits: simplicity and transparency, collaboration and interoperability, and efficiency and cost-effectiveness.

Our neutrality and independence are preserved by legal structure, governance and articles of incorporation. We are building our systems and services in accordance with our core principles. We are also honoring the Principles of Open Scholarly Infrastructure (POSI) to ensure sustainability and to preserve the goals of the OA Switchboard in the future.