Following a two year negotiation between Jisc, on behalf of UK institutions, and Elsevier, the UK has reached a transformative agreement that allows UK corresponding authors to publish open access in most Elsevier subscription journals. This is the largest UK transformative agreement yet negotiated.

UCL has a number of other new transformative agreements this year, including with society and not for profit publishers, across a wide range of disciplines. These include Cambridge University Press, Royal Society, Bristol University Press and John Benjamins. Details of UCL’s 32 agreements are on our transformative agreements webpage.

The negotiations

In 2021, the UK’s total spend with Elsevier totalled more than £50m, but only 25% of UK-authored articles were published Gold open access. The negotiations focused on reducing costs to sustainable levels, and providing immediate open access (on publication) to UK research. The new agreement has achieved significant savings, while allowing 80% of UK research in Elsevier journals to be published Gold open access at no additional cost, thus raising the visibility and impact of UK research. This also provides UKRI- and Wellcome-funded papers in most Elsevier journals with a publishing route that complies with their funder’s open access policy.

Using the agreement

To use the agreement, your paper must be of an eligible type, your journal must be covered by the agreement, and the submitting corresponding author must be affiliated with UCL or another UK institution.

The agreement covers most Elsevier subscription journals, including Lancet and Cell Press titles. There is a list of journals in UCL’s agreements on our transformative agreements webpage. Research and review papers are eligible (along with certain other types – see the same webpage).

The submitting corresponding author should use their UCL affiliation and email address in the manuscript and in Elsevier’s submission system. After acceptance, they will receive a link to Elsevier’s ‘post-acceptance author journey’, where they will be given the option to choose Gold open access under the agreement. Research funders require the CC BY licence, so this option should be chosen as appropriate.

We look forward to supporting UCL academics with this agreement.