CCC Co-Funded Pilot Report Details Goals, Activities, Initial Results, and Next Steps in the RA21 Project
November 6, 2018 – Danvers, Mass. – The International Association of Scientific, Technical, and Medical Publishers (STM) and the National Information Standards Organization (NISO) have released their RA21 Corporate Pilot Report, co-funded by Copyright Clearance Center, Inc. (CCC), a leader in advancing copyright, accelerating knowledge, and powering innovation. The report identifies best practices for adopting a federated identity approach to streamline the user experience for access to subscribed content outside institutional internet protocol (IP) domains.
CCC, along with publishers, libraries, and other interested parties, have been working together since 2016 toward improved user access to subscribed content across a range of content platforms and devices. The corporate pilot, which began in early 2017, included a survey of Pharma Documentation Ring (P-D-R) companies and confirmed the readiness of those companies for a federated identity management system. The five P-D-R companies that participated in the corporate pilot are: AbbVie, BASF, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), Novartis, and Roche – alongside four publisher participants – ACS, Elsevier, Springer Nature, and Wiley.
The three key goals of the corporate pilot were improved user login experience at the publisher sites, provision for granular usage statistics reporting, and the ability to easily set up and maintain Single Sign-On with multiple publishers. The RA21 corporate pilot successfully exceeded each goal. Next, the pilot will move into its post-project phase of identifying potential parties to operate any necessary centralized infrastructure to support the RA21 user experience.
“We were proud to co-fund this pilot from beginning to end as a demonstration of our commitment to industry initiatives and improving resource access,” said Tracey Armstrong, President and CEO, CCC. “We look forward to our continued work with RA21 as it starts preparing for its post-project phase and potentially the creation of a central discovery service.”
“Publishers, researchers, and libraries have relied on IP addresses to authorize content access for many years,” said Babis Marmanis, Executive Vice President and CTO, CCC. “In today’s environment, these groups require more effective solutions to facilitate a seamless, intuitive, and consistent user experience. The RA21 pilot is the first step in reaching this goal.”
“Perhaps RA21’s biggest achievement so far is bringing together all interested parties under one banner to enable cross-industry collaboration focused on solving a critical industry issue for the benefit of all,” said Jo McShea, VP and Lead Analyst, Outsell, Inc. “RA21 is now at the cusp of realizing its ambitions – assuming publisher and institutional buy-in – having met its original stated requirements.”
“The pharma industry as a whole has recognized the need to enable a seamless user experience anytime, anywhere,” said Helen Malone, Director of the Information at GSK and President of the P-D-R. “I’m delighted that the PDR has been instrumental in driving the user requirements from the outset. I’m also thrilled that GSK, on behalf of the PDR, has co-sponsored this important Corporate Pilot to a successful outcome.”
Final best practice recommendations from RA21 are expected towards the end of 2018. Following that, the standard NISO process for recommended practices will be followed.
CCC will host a webinar about the RA21 Corporate Pilot results on November 15 at 10:30 EST/3:30 GMT.