Springer Nature and DEAL: Considerable progress in negotiations

4. December 2018

Springer Nature and Project DEAL of the Alliance of Science Organisations in Germany have made considerable progress in their negotiations on a groundbreaking model for publishing and reading scientific literature, as the project’s negotiation leader Prof. Dr. Horst Hippler, and Dagmar Laging, Vice President Institutional Sales Europe at Springer Nature both report. The joint objective of Springer Nature and Project DEAL is to bring negotiations to a successful conclusion by mid-2019 at the latest.

As an intermediate step the negotiating partners have now again agreed to a cost-neutral extension of the existing contracts for 2019. This provides the necessary time to conclude discussions on the complex proposed model. At the same time Springer Nature and Project DEAL aim to provide stability for science organisations and researchers with continued access to Springer Nature content.

Prof. Dr. Horst Hippler: "We are confident to come to a final conclusion of a DEAL contract with Springer Nature by mid-2019. This cost-neutral extension to the terms of 2018 for 2019 is an expression of the good cooperation between the two negotiating partners. "

Dagmar Laging: „The negotiations with the DEAL team have progressed considerably in the past months – we are now on the home stretch. The renewed extension of existing contracts that we have now agreed gives us the necessary time to focus on the actual implementation to ensure a smooth transition for all involved from the old to the new structure.”


The DEAL project was set up by the Alliance of Science Organisations in Germany. As part of the project, national licensing agreements are to be implemented for the entire portfolio of electronic journals of large academic publishers. Further information on the project is available here: www.projekt-deal.de/about-deal

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