Projekt DEAL (set up by the Alliance of Science Organisations in Germany) represents 700 institutions in Germany including universities, universities of applied sciences, research institutions and state and regional libraries. The project aims to implement national licensing agreements with large academic publishers.
A Memorandum of Understanding between Projekt Deal and Springer Nature has been reached. The final contract is scheduled to be signed later in 2019.
The agreement with Springer Nature will provide substantially enhanced access to Springer Nature content for almost all of the German research landscape. An estimated 13,000 articles by German scholars and scientists are expected to be published open access (OA) each year, increasing the visibility and usage of German research around the world.
The Transformative Agreement will ensure researchers and students across all disciplines affiliated with the member institutions will be able to publish OA in the vast majority of the Springer Nature journal portfolio as well as read the full contents of those journals including backfiles from 1997.
For more information, see the announcement on the Max Planck Gesellschaft website.