The Strategic Investments of Content Providers | Ithaka S+R

"From Elsevier and Springer to EBSCO and ProQuest, these publishers and content providers are reducing their reliance on their content businesses as engines of growth. While these businesses remain strong, they are pursuing one of two newer directions for greater growth....The “big deal” model of licensed content products has proved enormously profitable for the commercial scientific publishers and deeply problematic for academic libraries. The open access movement has sought to rebalance these dynamics, and political and organizational developments could yet unleash changes that would profoundly and negatively impact their business. Certainly, looking at other information businesses, such as journalism, there is reason for caution.  To date, however, if publishers have not actually co-opted open access they have certainly found ways to coexist with “gold” or hybrid models in conjunction with their licensed content products. Overall, the academic content product businesses have continued to thrive in recent years.

Nevertheless, in assessing the risks, major academic publishers and content platforms have recognized that their businesses are mature and have taken a number of steps to diversify..."