Member News & Announcements, April IO 2025
Awards & Honorable Mentions
BISG to Honor Sourcebooks' Dominique Raccah
Book Industry Study Group (BISG), Voting Member, News Announcement, March 18, 2025
The Book Industry Study Group (BISG) will recognize Dominique Raccah, Founder and CEO of award-winning publisher Sourcebooks, with the Sally Dedecker Award for Lifetime Service. Raccah will be honored at BISG’s Annual Meeting in New York, taking place on April 25, 2025, at the Times Center.
Established in 2013 and named for one of BISG’s longtime volunteers and advocates, the Sally Dedecker Award recognizes an individual who has made a positive impact on the book publishing industry. Throughout her career, Dominique Raccah has led Sourcebooks in ways that have made it a beacon for change in the industry. An entrepreneur who embraces change and leads with an author-first mindset, Raccah has built the company from a one-woman startup into the sixth largest U.S. publisher and the fastest-growing publisher in the UK. Under her leadership, Sourcebooks has pioneered new ways to connect authors and readers, championed banned books and diverse voices, and led the industry in data-driven publishing, redefining what it means to be a book publisher in the 21st century.
Emerald shortlisted in the British Book Awards 2025
Emerald Group Publishing, Voting Member, Press Release, March 14, 2025
This year, The British Book Awards celebrates its 35th year, and we’re honoured to be part of the celebrations and to be recognised for our contributions to the world of academic publishing.
The judges highlighted some key milestones for Emerald in 2024, including the acquisition of Information Age Publishing, the launch of our new bookstore, our strong sense of mission, and our commitment to sustainability. 2024 also saw the launch of our new Open Lab which explores open access models, and we were recognised as a Times Top 50 Employer for Gender Equality and one of the Top 50 Inspiring Workplaces in UK and Ireland.
Utilizing Artificial Intelligence
EBSCO Information Services Launches Newest Artificial Intelligence Features
EBSCO, Voting Member, Press Release, March 24, 2025
EBSCO Information Services (EBSCO) is introducing two new artificial intelligence (AI) features, AI Insights and Natural Language Search (NLS). AI Insights generates a short list of key insights from full-text articles, while NLS improves the researcher’s experience when using their natural language, enhancing context handling and overall search accuracy. These new capabilities are part of EBSCO’s ongoing commitment to enhancing the researcher journey and user experience.
AI Insights creates on-demand, high-level summary statements, or “insights” from full-text articles, allowing researchers to quickly assess the relevancy of an article for their research topic. The insights are grounded on the article full text to reduce hallucinations using a Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) method. AI Insights are vetted by EBSCO librarians via human-in-the-loop review. NLS enables researchers to search in their natural language, ensuring the user’s intent is honored. The underlying search technology leverages EBSCO’s relevance ranking, subject query expansion via the Unified Subject Index of linked data-controlled vocabularies and authoritative metadata, with the addition of AI query expansion for common words.
Wiley Releases AI Guidelines for Authors
Wiley, Voting Member, Press Release, March 13, 2025
Wiley (NYSE: WLY), one of the world’s largest publishers and a global leader in research and learning, released a set of guidelines on the responsible and effective use of artificial intelligence (AI) in authorship this week at the London Book Fair. In the new guidelines and accompanying FAQs, Wiley provides suggestions to authors on how to utilize AI tools in their manuscript preparation while preserving the author’s authentic voice and expertise, maintaining reliable, trusted, and accurate content, safeguarding intellectual property and privacy, and meeting ethics and integrity best practices.
The guidelines respond directly to broad demand for publisher guidance in utilizing AI, requested by around 70% of researchers in Wiley’s recent ExplanAItions study, and were informed by extensive interviews with authors, editorial staff and AI experts.
Innovative unveils plan for AI strategy in product development
Clarivate Analytics, Voting Member, Blog Post, March 13, 2025
Today, on IUG 2025 opening day, Yariv Kursh, Senior Vice President and General Manager for Innovative, from Clarivate, announced a strategy for responsibly harnessing artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance engagement, streamline workflows, and drive innovation for public and academic libraries.
Effectively navigating AI can be complex, as each user has unique needs and engages with libraries in different ways. Innovative, from Clarivate, anticipated these challenges and is introducing solutions to help libraries adapt with confidence. Through a carefully developed strategy and ongoing partnership with libraries, development of these AI-powered tools will eliminate uncertainty, streamline operations, and ensure libraries can serve diverse communities with ease and confidence.
Open Access, Open Science
Empowering Research: How the University of Alberta Library Supports Open Science
University of Alberta, L.S.A. Consortia Member (CRKN), Blog Post, March 17, 2025
At the University of Alberta Library, we are committed to advancing open science practices that revolutionize research conduct and dissemination. Our efforts focus on promoting transparency, accessibility, and collaboration to enhance the robustness and reproducibility of research.
We play a pivotal role in supporting open access publishing at the University of Alberta. Our team negotiates agreements with publishers to reduce or eliminate article processing charges (APCs) for our researchers. These efforts increase the visibility of U of A research and democratize access to knowledge globally.
IOP Publishing and Songshan Lake Materials Laboratory launch AI for Science, a new diamond open access journal
IOP Publishing, Voting Member, News Announcement, March 10, 2025
IOP Publishing (IOPP) and the Songshan Lake Materials Laboratory (SLAB) have launched a new diamond open access journal, AI for Science (AI4S). The interdisciplinary journal will cover key Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) topics including applied physics, materials science, chemical science, biological science, and mathematics.
AI for Science meets an increasing need for high-quality journals dedicated to AI applications in scientific disciplines. AI and ML research stands out as one of the most dynamic and rapidly expanding research areas. In the last five years, it has expanded by nearly ten times the rate of general scientific output.
In Support of Research
Cambridge to conduct ‘radical’ review of open research
Cambridge University Press, Voting Member, News Announcement, March 18, 2025
Cambridge University Press is to conduct a “radical, community-led” review of the open research publishing ecosystem. The review aims to identify bold and workable solutions that support innovation and researchers’ needs in a manner that’s sustainable for all major stakeholders.
Cambridge University Press is inviting researchers, librarians, publishers, funders, and publishing partners across the globe to participate in the review, via workshops, interviews and an online survey supported by independent research consultancy, Shift Insight.
Industry Goals & Developments
Sustainability at BISG
Book Industry Study Group (BISG), Voting Member, Blog Post, March 17, 2025
Interest in—and awareness of—the need for more sustainable practices is growing in the United States. Although other markets, including the United Kingdom and the European Union, are more advanced in their consideration of sustainability goals, the global nature of many businesses means that international trends are affecting US organizations as well.
Various companies and nonprofit organizations have started sustainability efforts. Some are well established, dating to the mid-2000s. At the same time, overall knowledge of the basic components of sustainability—the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), carbon footprints, and scopes 1, 2, and 3 emissions, as examples—is limited in the US book industry. More can be done to build awareness, educate, and foster action around sustainability in the US market.
Partnerships & Collaborations
Silverchair’s AI Lab Delivers Oxford Academic AI Discovery Assistant for Dynamic Research Support
Silverchair and Oxford University Press (OUP), Voting Members, Press Release, March 17, 2025
Silverchair and Oxford University Press (OUP) announce the launch of Oxford Academic’s AI Discovery Assistant, delivered via the Silverchair Platform. Jointly developed by the Silverchair AI team and OUP, the new tool supports researchers through an intuitive search interface that delivers highly relevant results accompanied by AI-generated summaries.
Silverchair’s AI Lab is designed to transparently test and pilot potential AI solutions with our clients, producing several beta features and the AI Playground for safe experimentation. Since then, Silverchair has been working on platform-wide AI functionality and collaborating on client-specific projects to deliver value to users.
Libraries, Collections & Archives
The Library Turns 225!
Library of Congress, Voting Member, Blog Post, March 13, 2025
How it started: When Congress established the Library of Congress in 1800, it provided $5,000 and purchased a collection of 152 works in 740 volumes and three maps for the use of its members. A joint committee selected the books and organized the volumes themselves when they arrived from London.
How it’s going: 225 years later, the Library has amassed what is widely considered the greatest collection of knowledge ever assembled. And, while Congress remains the Library’s first audience, the Library also reaches millions of people around the world, who now have access to its unparalleled resources.
Public Outreach Programs
JSTOR Access in Prison passes million-user threshold
ITHAKA/JStor/Portico, Voting Member, News Announcement, March 11, 2025
In just over a year, the JSTOR Access in Prison program has doubled its reach in US state and federal prison facilities.
In late 2023, JAIP celebrated reaching 1,000 prisons and providing access to more than 500,000 incarcerated learners. Today, more than one million incarcerated learners can now research, download, and read academic journal articles, books, and other scholarly materials via the JSTOR platform.
Future Trends: Projected Outlook and Insights
Springer Nature achieves revenue and profit targets and projects further growth for 2025
Springer Nature, Voting Member, Press Release, March 18, 2025
Springer Nature, one of the leading publishers of research in the world, today announced its results for the financial year 2024, demonstrating continued growth and a strong operational performance. Revenue was €1,847 million, representing, on an underlying1 basis, a 5% increase over the same period in 2023. Adjusted operating profit increased to €512 million, equating to underlying growth1 of 7%.
Frank Vrancken Peeters, CEO of Springer Nature, said: “Our strong results demonstrate our ability to consistently deliver value for our communities while driving innovation in the academic publishing industry. We publish an ever-increasing amount of high-quality open access content and invest in technology and people to ensure we consistently outperform the market while growing responsibly and sustainably.”