Thanks to the support of the international library community our Read & Publish Open Access (OA) initiative continues to go from strength to strength, and the number of participating institutions has more than doubled over the last year. This success has helped to us to exceed our Transformative Journal targets for OA growth and takes us closer to converting our journals to full Open Access.

As part of our ongoing commitment to fair and transparent pricing, we ensure that our library customers are not double charged for OA content. The % change in the number of OA articles is therefore deducted from the annual price increase to give the net decrease/increase in price.

In recognition of the financial difficulties our library customers continue to face, our Board of Directors – all of whom are practising scientists – has approved an annual price which is significantly lower than the current UK inflation rate and the increase in publishing costs that we are experiencing as a result.

After the adjustment for double dipping is applied, the net price decrease/increase for our journals in 2023 is as follows:

• Development +1.08%
• Journal of Cell Science +1.58%
• Journal of Experimental Biology -0.65%

The full pricing calculations can be viewed here.

Matthew Freeman, Chairman of The Company of Biologists:

“Our Read & Publish Open Access initiative has been a great success thanks to the tremendous support we have received from the international library community. Over 500 institutions in 39 countries are now participating. We exceeded our Transformative Journal targets for OA growth in 2021. We are also on track to meet our targets in 2022, and this is taking us closer to our goal of converting our hybrid journals to full OA.

In recognition of this support from our library customers, and the ongoing economic challenges that they face, I am pleased to say that our Board has agreed that the Company will absorb a considerable proportion of our cost increases in 2023, and that the net price change for our journals will therefore range from –0.65% to +1.58%.

We look forward to continuing to work with our library partners to promote the growth of Open Access publishing in the biological and biomedical sciences.”

The Company of Biologists is a not-for-profit publishing organisation dedicated to supporting and inspiring the biological community. We partner with libraries and library consortia to enable biologists worldwide to access our leading peer-reviewed hybrid journals: Development, Journal of Cell Science and Journal of Experimental Biology.

We have been committed to Open Access (OA) for over 17 years. We publish two fully OA journals – Disease Models & Mechanisms and Biology Open. Our hybrid journals were the first in the world to be afforded Transformative Journal status by Plan S and over 500 institutions in 39 countries are now participating in our cost-neutral Read & Publish OA initiative. We also have Read & Publish agreements with nine library consortia and an international library organisation.