Open access: ÅAU's funding for open access fees

ÅAU-affiliated researchers can publish OA for free or at a discounted APC with many publishers. Check below how to access the discount or voucher before submitting your manuscript. The procedure varies by publisher, but generally, the corresponding author must use their abo.fi email address as proof of affiliation with ÅAU. 

Updated 10th March 2025. Ongoing FinELib negotiations affect the possibilities to publish open access after the turn of the year. There will be a break in OA publishing if an agreement is not reached. Applies to the following publishers: ACM and Wiley. Read more in FinELib's press release.

The following agreements are in effect:

Click on the publisher's name for instructions on how to utilize the discount/voucher and for lists of journals included in the agreement.

ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) - full open access in journals and conference proceedings. Covers articles accepted 1.7.2022–31.12.2024.

Cambridge University Press - full open access and hybrid (included in CUP's Full Collection) for free. Articles accepted 1.1.2024-31.12.2025. 

Cell Press  (Elsevier) - hybrid, for free. (Peer- reviewed articles accepted 1.1.2025-31.12.2025). Selected journals.

Elsevier - Hybrid for free and full open access, discount 15% (limited number of credits annually for articles accepted 1.1.2024-31.12.2025) in not all, but more than 1600 journals.
​(NB! Elsevier has introduced so-called mirror journals, which are open access and go by the same names as highly ranked journals with the addition 'X'. Although the editors are the same, these are separate journals (separate ISSN-numbers etc) and the material in them is not published in the highly ranked original. At this point (March 2019) we recommend considering the option of publishing in the original publication in combination with parallel publishing of the accepted manuscript.)

Emerald - hybrid, for free and for free in two full open access journals: International Journal of Climate Change Strategies and Management and Mental Illness (1.1.2025-31.12.2026)

IEL (IEEE)  - Full open access and hybrid, for free. (1.1.2024-31.12.2025) 

MDPI - Full open access, discount 10% (pick Åbo Akademi University in the drop-down menu under "Selected institutions and societies have individual agreements..."). Note that this institutional membership discount can't be combined with other discounts and vouchers. You can choose which you prefer to use for each submission. (Agreement valid until 30.4.2025).

Nature Research - hybrid, for free. (Articles accepted 1.1.2025-31.12.2026) 

OUP (Oxford University Press) - Hybrid, for free. Full OA 15 % discount. (For articles in production phase 1.1.2024-31.12.2025.)

RSC (Royal Society of Chemistry) - hybrid, for free (2024-2025) and full open access, for free (2024).

Sage - hybrid and full open access, for free. For articles accepted 1.1.2025-31.12.2026.

Springer Nature (=Springer) - hybrid for free. Some journals which have transformed from hybrid to full OA are also included. (Mostly hybrid journals in the Springer Compact collection, articles accepted 1.1.2024-31.12.2025.)

Taylor & Francis - Hybrid, for free. Limited number of vouchers annually. (For articles accepted 1.1.2025-31.12.2026 in journals with an Open Select-offer.)

Wiley -  full open access and hybrid, for free (articles accepted 1.1.2023-31.12.2024). ( Wiley's own instruction webpage for the discount.) Limited quota. The article quota has run out 10.12.024!

The agreement with the following publisher has expired 31.12.2024:

Frontiers - FinELib's collaboration with Frontiers has ended 31.12.2024.

The agreement with the following publisher has expired 31.12.2023:

ACS (American Chemical Society) - FinELib's collaboration with ACS has ended. Read more here: FinELib 10.10.2024

Applications are not processed in July.

Do you have an article almost ready for submission that could be published in an OA journal but lack funding for the fee? Since 2020, ÅAU has had an APC pool. The aim of the APC pool is to provide ÅAU-affiliated researchers with equal opportunities for OA publishing (in addition to the possibility of parallel publishing) and to encourage publishing in full OA channels.
 

Application procedure 

The pool's funds are granted based on a short application via an online form, submitted by the corresponding author. The application should be submitted when the article is close to submission to avoid long reservation periods until publication decisions. Applications are evaluated against given criteria by the ÅAU library open science team (and the process is overseen by the vice-rector for research).

Apply via the online form, with an expected response time of five working days. Applications are not processed in July.

Principles for granting APC support 

Who can apply? 

Researchers primarily affiliated with ÅAU, whose publications are reported to the Ministry of Education and Culture (for ÅAU), and who act as the corresponding/submitting author, more specifically:

1. Researchers employed by ÅAU (all career levels)
2. Researchers with affiliation agreements for non-employed personnel (grant-holders with non-employee agreements, all career levels)
3. Emeriti

Please note:

• Researchers with external research funding (such as Research Council of Finland projects started before 1.1.2021) are expected to use their project budget for OA costs first. Apply to the APC pool when the funder requires OA, but APC expenses are not included in the budget (e.g., Research Council of Finland since 2021). 
• Two articles per corresponding author can be funded per year (this does not exclude co-authorship in other funded articles). Exceptions to this rule are possible at the end of the year if there is still funding left.
• Researchers solely affiliated as docents do not report their publications to the Ministry of Education and Culture for ÅAU and therefore cannot be granted support.
   

Requirements for the publication and the publication channel:

1. The journal is fully OA (= journal in which all articles are openly accessible and which does not charge subscription fees).
2. The journal/publication channel is registered in DOAJ.org or Scopus or can in other ways be evaluated and confirmed to be serious.
   • Peer review: The publication channel has a serious quality review process, and the publication for which the APC funding is applied will undergo such evaluation.
   • The publisher/journal has clear principles of publication ethics (corresponding to the Open Access Scholarly Publishers Associations' (OASPA) Code of Conduct)
3. The publication channel has JUFO level 1-3.
4. The article is published with an open license (preferably CC-BY 4.0, if nothing else is offered by the publisher, CC-BY-NC or CC-BY-NC-ND is accepted).
5. Possible vouchers/discounts available for ÅAU-affiliated researchers must be used (see left column).

Why is hybrid open access not supported? 

Hybrid publishing means that OA publishing is an additional service in a subscription-based journal, where only part of the content is openly accessible. The hybrid model is expensive since journals charge the universities both subscription/license fees and APCs ("double dipping"). For hybrid publications, parallel publishing in AboCRIS (and other open repositories) is recommended as the path to OA. Hybrid OA is also possible through ÅAU's read and publish agreements (see left column for vouchers and discounts).

To make books OA, a BPC (book processing charge) can be paid. Note that possibilities for BPC discounts are not included in FinELib's or ÅAU library's agreements with publishers. Therefore, ÅAU has a BPC pool that can cover the BPC fee for opening ÅAU-affiliated authors' monographs.

For edited works, parallel publishing of chapters according to the publisher's guidelines applies. The BPC pool also does not fund the opening of individual chapters. 

Principles for granting BPC support 

Who can apply? The same affiliation definition applies as for the APC pool (see Who can apply? in the middle column).

Requirements for the publication and the publication channel: The BPC pool can cover BPC costs when the publication meets the following criteria:

1. Publication type: The book is a peer-reviewed monograph (C1 according to the universities' funding model). For peer review, the Ministry of Education and Culture's definition (available in Finnish only) applies in the first place. The peer reviewers are independent in relation to the manuscript being reviewed, i.e., they are not the editors of the publication. The BPC pool does not support opening edited works or individual chapters.
2. JUFO classification: The book publisher and/or book series has JUFO level 3 or 2.
3.  Secondary aspects such as sustainability and equal access may also be considered: motivation for why the work should be OA, such as a central readership's lack of access if the book were closed.

Application procedure 

Send the following information to openscience@abo.fi:

1. Author(s) of the monograph, along with affiliation information.
2. Publisher, series, and working title of the book.
3. Estimated BPC costs (in euros, incl. VAT). For
   co-authored works where the authors are affiliated with different Finnish universities, the costs are primarily shared between the home organizations.
4. Any other funding sources, e.g., project funds or the possibility of shared costs between universities.
5. Estimated publication date.
6. Available open license options. The publication should be given an open license (preferably CC-BY 4.0, if nothing else is offered by the publisher, CC-BY-NC or CC-BY-NC-ND is accepted).
7. Special motivations to why the work should
   be OA.

In the overall assessment, both the above criteria and the BPC costs are considered. Individual assessment is made on a case-by-case basis. The evaluation group consists of the Chief Librarian, the Vice Rector for Research, and the Leading Coordinator for Open Science.