What open-access mandates require
Open-access mandates make publication access a condition of research funding, specifying when work must be available and which publishing and licensing routes meet that condition.
Development of public-funder mandates
In September 2018, eleven national research funding organisations, supported by the European Commission and European Research Council, launched cOAlition S to pursue full and immediate open access. Its original ambition was that by 1 January 2020, publications from participating public grants would appear in compliant open-access journals or platforms.
By 2019, Plan S was expected to take effect on 1 January 2021, requiring immediate online access to scholarly articles arising from coalition-funded research and setting conditions for copyright, licensing, cost transparency and business models. Science Europe coordinated the plan, with European Commission and European Research Council support; by August 2019, the coalition had sixteen public funders and two charitable foundations.
The August 2019 membership was:
| Funder | Country |
|---|---|
| Der Wissenschaftsfonds | Austria |
| Academy of Finland | Finland |
| Agence Nationale de la Recherche | France |
| Science Foundation Ireland | Ireland |
| Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare | Italy |
| Luxembourg National Research Fund | Luxembourg |
| Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research | Netherlands |
| Research Council of Norway | Norway |
| National Science Centre | Poland |
| Slovenian Research Agency | Slovenia |
| Swedish Research Council for Health, Working Life and Welfare | Sweden |
| FORMAS | Sweden |
| UK Research and Innovation | United Kingdom |
| National Science and Technology Council | Zambia |
| Higher Council for Science and Technology | Jordan |
| Vinnova | Sweden |
| Wellcome | United Kingdom |
| Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation | United States |
US federal funders had not adopted Plan S in 2019, while Chinese funders had expressed support in December 2018 without committing clearly to every principle. On 25 August 2022, the US administration announced a move towards immediate public access to papers describing taxpayer-funded work.
Publishing conditions and reactions
The 2019 Plan S arrangements allowed different compliant business models, including gold open access and time-limited transformative agreements for subscription journals moving to full open access. Hybrid journals were not categorically prohibited, but coalition grant funding would not pay their fees; funders would cover fees at other compliant venues.
Publishers were expected to disclose costs for triage, peer review, editorial work, copyediting, art and layout, with monitoring and possible standardised reimbursement caps if prices were unreasonable. The conditions included copyright retention by authors or institutions and CC BY 4.0 licensing with funder-approved exceptions, and the coalition worked with directories and other partners to identify compliant journals, platforms, repositories and agreements.
Reactions in 2019 differed by stakeholder:
- Subscription publishers predicted disruption to their business models; Springer Nature and Wiley supported open access but sought support for hybrid journals.
- Gold open-access publishers such as PLOS welcomed the plan as compatible with their journals.
- Societies including the American Association for the Advancement of Science feared journal closures and reduced services because restrictions on hybrid funding and permissive licensing threatened revenue.
- More than 1,900 academics supported funder mandates despite short-term publishing limits, seeking wider scholarship access.
- More than 600 researchers opposed Plan S restrictions as a threat to academic freedom, citing subscription-journal exclusions, high processing fees and risks to international collaboration.
- A journal editor warned that withdrawal of funder payments could shift fees to researchers, while fee caps might encourage volume at the expense of quality and originality.
The coalition pledged to disregard journal prestige, including impact factors, in funding decisions, although replacement metrics were unclear in 2019. Wider adoption was expected to affect publishers and societies substantially, so writers and editors in those sectors were advised to understand the rules and prepare for their effects.
Pharmaceutical-company mandates
The case for company mandates rests on industry’s role as a major research funder: a 2017 account estimated that companies funded more than half of biomedical research, while a 2022 account put their share of medical research as high as two thirds.
Shire introduced its policy on 2 January 2018, requiring company-supported preclinical, clinical and postmarketing research to be freely available promptly after publication. A 2022 company account described Shire’s mandate as the first in the pharmaceutical industry and Takeda’s 2020 adoption after acquiring Shire as the first top-ten-company requirement covering all globally funded research. The policy extended Takeda’s trial-transparency commitment and was justified in terms of reputation, business performance, trust in its research and patient centricity.
Ipsen announced a mandate in 2019 and Galápagos in 2020. Implementation can be slow in a large company because leadership and staff need alignment and legacy assumptions can associate open access with inferior journal quality.
A company implementation checklist has three parts:
- Appropriateness to act. Recognise the company’s role as a major funder and researchers’ familiarity with funder requirements.
- Strategic benefits. Connect open access to company principles such as transparency, rapid access for clinicians and patients and potential effects on diagnostic journeys; challenge assumptions equating open access with poor journal quality.
- Implementation. Align senior medical, research and development, legal and compliance leadership; incorporate the requirement into policies, standard operating procedures and research and author agreements; budget with medical affairs for fees where needed; provide training and alignment after launch; and work pragmatically towards embargo-free access and CC BY licensing within available publishing options.
Open Pharma’s position and monitoring
Open Pharma’s position statement made equal open-access opportunities for company-funded and other research an immediate priority, aiming for free reading from publication, with equal licensing terms including CC BY as a longer-term goal. By 4 May 2023 it had more than 250 endorsements from individuals and institutions including publishers, companies, patient groups and open-scholarship organisations. The collaboration reported that members used it for internal awareness and open-access targets and considered this likely to have contributed to increased industry open-access publishing.
Journal policies can constrain company mandates: a 2018 cross-sectional study of 37 journals with impact factors of at least fifteen found only one offering CC BY licensing to commercially funded research. In 2023, some high-impact journals still offered company-funded authors no open-access option or no CC BY option.
Open Pharma and the Lens developed a free public dashboard comparing access rates, types and licences for publications with university-affiliated and pharmaceutical-company-affiliated authors. An initial 2023 snapshot suggested more frequent CC BY licensing among university-affiliated publications, but could not establish whether journal or author policies explained the difference.
A June 2022 roundtable proposed continued promotion of mandatory open-access publication for industry-sponsored research.