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Institutions and companies embrace eBooks, Springer signs agreements with several universities and corporations


WEBWIRE

Berlin / Heidelberg / New York, 8 November 2006 - Following the launch of its redesigned online platform this summer, Springer Science+Business Media has seen significant success for its eBooks from both the academic and the business world. In recent months, important agreements have been signed with academic institutions all over the world, including, among others, the Great Western Library Alliance consortium(USA), the University of Chicago (USA), the University of Manchester (UK), the University of Oslo (Norway), the University of Jordan, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology/ETH, the Akademintorg / Russian Foundation for Basic research consortium, several members of the KESLI consortium (Korea) and several institutes in India. In addition, several companies have purchased Springer eBooks, such as Siemens, DaimlerChrysler, Merck and the Hewlett-Packard Research Laboratory, among others.

“We are very pleased with our purchase of the Springer eBooks Collection. The titles in the packages lend themselves very well to electronic delivery, and our more than 12,000 students and researchers will benefit greatly from them,” said James Mouw, Assistant Director for Technical and Electronic Services, The University of Chicago.

“The John Rylands University Library is a long-term purchaser of printed Springer monographs and book series and is delighted to be able to deliver all of Springer’s electronic book production for 2005, 2006 and 2007 to its users at The University of Manchester,” said Dr. Diana Leitch, Deputy University Librarian, with responsibility for information resources and academic support. “We already provide an extensive range of e-resources to our users and the addition of this excellent package to our portfolio will greatly benefit the nearly 40,000 students, researchers and academic staff studying and working at The University of Manchester. The fact that we were able to use our existing long-term subscription agent, Harrassowitz, to handle this deal has been an added bonus for us.”

With immediate effect, all students and researchers at the individual universities and companies have electronic access to the Springer eBooks they have purchased. Currently nearly 13,000 eBooks are available on www.springerlink.com. “Given the relatively short period that we have been offering eBooks, we are pleasantly surprised at our customers’ enthusiasm for them. This is due in part to the special offer that is available to all customers who purchase the 2007 eBook Collection before the end of this year. Institutions and firms that purchase the 2007 eBook Collection by this date will get the electronic versions of all Springer books published in 2005 and 2006 as well,” explained Peter Hendriks, President Global Sales and Marketing, Springer.

The Springer eBook Collection was launched at the ALA Annual Conference in New Orleans (June 2006), concurrent with a donation of eBooks, worth approximately USD 1 million, to seven graduate school-level institutions affected by Hurricane Katrina. Since then, eBooks have been a central theme and were the subject of much interest at the Frankfurt Book Fair in October.

Springer allows unlimited simultaneous access to eBooks. The eBooks’ PDF and HTML documents are fully searchable and can be downloaded and printed. In addition, once a library purchases Springer’s eBook Collection, they own the book content for their use in perpetuity. Every year approximately 3,000 new Springer titles can be added by a renewal of the agreement. Libraries can purchase a complete collection of all Springer titles from a copyright year or they can choose to purchase one or more of the 12 subjects (e.g., engineering, medicine, computer science, mathematics, etc.). Individual eBooks are available from retail partners.

About The University of Chicago:
The University of Chicago was founded in 1890. With over 12,000 students and more than 2,000 faculty members, it is a national leader in higher education and research. Besides the undergraduate College, the four graduate divisions, and the six professional schools, there are libraries, laboratories, museums, clinics, nursery and K-12 schools, a continuing-studies program, and an academic press. The University has counted 79 Nobel prizewinners among its faculty members, students, or researchers; six Laureates are currently on the faculty. The University of Chicago has had and continues to have a profound impact on American higher education, influencing curricula across the country.

About The University of Manchester:
The University of Manchester is the UK’s largest single-site university with a proud history of achievement and an ambitious agenda for the future. It has an exceptional record of generating and sharing new ideas, and the quality, breadth and volume of its research activity is unparalled in the UK. It is built on the shoulders of academic giants and can lay claim to 20 Nobel prizewinners amongst its former staff and students. There are four faculties, divided into schools covering major groupings of subjects, and over 35,000 students and 4,500 academic and research staff study and work there. Its John Rylands University Library is world-famous, providing extensive printed resources from the 6th Century BC onwards and the UK’s largest collection of electronic resources.

About Springer:
Springer is a leading international scientific publishing company for print and online content with a reputation for excellence since 1842. It publishes over 1,250 journals and 3,500 new book titles each year, and offers online scientific information such as peer-reviewed journals, eReferences, eBooks and an Online Archives Collection via SpringerLink, its electronic platform. Springer is part of Springer Science+Business Media, which employs some 5,000 dedicated professionals at 70 publishing companies in more than 20 countries throughout the world.



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