OAPA offers a model that strengthens long-term system resilence for open content that is freely available to all.
2026–2028 Prospectus
Sustaining diamond open publishing in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand
OAPA launches its inaugural international Library Sustaining Open Package to enable Australian-based infrastructure to scale to meet growing community and academic demand for diamond open-access publishing of scholarly work.
400–500
Projected articles across the portfolio in 2026
2
High-performing Scopus-ranked journals in the current portfolio
0 APCs
Diamond model with no author charges and no paywalls
Why this matters
Why libraries are being asked to act now
We know the system is under increased pressure from library budgets, dissatisfaction with APC and commercial models. We are contributing to the rise of community-governed approaches to open publishing infrastructure.
While APCs can range from $1,000 to $18,000 AUD or more, individual academics are having to choose between supporting more research time on grants to pay for APCs.
All OAPA core infrastructure is located in Australia to enable data sovereignty and national capacity building in data infrastructure in the age of generative AI.
Investment case
Why OAPA is investable
OAPA has entered its scaling phase after developing a mature live publishing system with more than 1 million annual downnloads with and long-term growth capacity.
OAPA is already supporting active journals and expects to publish approximately 400–500 articles in 2026, and has current capacity to more than quadruple that volume.
OAPA leaders have supported the elevation and inclusion of journals into Scopus and Web of Science.
OAPA's model operates with large scale academic volunteers, and is seeking resourcing to transition to professional support needed for large-scale expansion of content.
OAPA provides editorial training, journal support, discoverability, metadata quality, and sector-facing publishing capability.
With the support of libraries, OAPA hopes to support leading academics to establish association and university-owned journals that can achieve Q1 status to compete with equivalent discipline journals.
OAPA is a community of academic editors, and focuses on maintaining a member-owned entity with communities of editors who meet regularly to openly share resources.
Core annual partnership
What the partnership funds
Contributions from libraries aim to fund new technology to reduce workload of academic editors, support professional staff, and possible journal 'flipping' or establishment from APC-environments over time.
Support for the technical environment required to run fully open journal operations.
Submission, review, editorial coordination, publication scheduling, and operational continuity.
Infrastructure that makes published research citable, discoverable, and usable across scholarly systems.
Support for visibility, standards, index readiness, and quality improvement across the portfolio.
Ongoing platform maintenance, system enhancement, and long-term sustainability rather than one-off build costs.
Support for editor and reviewer development, sector capability building, and publishing integrity systems.
Partnership structure
Library partnership tiers
We invite libraries to help accelerate our mission for more open and sustainable content.
| Tier | Intended segment | Annual contribution | Summary |
|---|---|---|---|
| Foundation Partner | Small universities and specialist institutions | $9,500 | Supports core publishing infrastructure and diamond open sustainability. |
| Anchor Partner | Mid-sized universities | $16,500 | Sustains publishing operations and contributes to growth of the portfolio. |
| Leadership Partner | Large universities | $22,500 | Higher-impact contribution reflecting institutional scale and sector leadership. |
| Strategic Partner | By negotiation | $30,000+ | For deeper strategic engagement, bundled initiatives, or named sponsorship. |
Three-year commitments can be referenced here if preferred, with annual entry also available.
OAPA is not a directory or book package, rather we are aiming to reduce the system cost of publishing knowledge through live journal publishing, hosting, training, discoverability support, and regional system-building.
Our model can support an open journal for less than the price of two full cost APCs in typical big-publisher journals.
Optional services
Add-on pathways for partner institutions
OAPA has a number of opportunities to contribute back to the ecosystem through enabling existing institutional infrastructure, training, and one-off programs that support expanding our mission.
Capability and training
Ten annual institutional places in Foundations of Academic Journal Editor or Foundations of Academic Peer Review (benchmarked to 1/12th of an AQF GradCert-level), four months and online.
Up to 25 places in a single two-day intensive at any Australian institution for institutional employees certification into the Foundations of Academic Peer Review or Academic Journal Editing
Contribute as a named Founding Partner to the development of one of the twelve core education offerings in our roadmap towards a Graduate Certificate in Open Academic Editing, and includes 10 places in the first year
Institution-owned journal support
Hosting, transfer support, indexing support, EIC Council access, and editor and reviewer training. Bulk packages available.
Once-off establishment support followed by annual support for hosting and ongoing journal development.
A structured review of governance, editorial workflow, metadata quality, indexing readiness, and discoverability.
Strategic publishing initiatives
Provides space for four fully open monograph-sponsored places annually under a named institutional sponsorship.
Sponsor a feasibility study into building an Australian and New Zealand Dissertation Press.
Support one emerging editor or managing editor through practical development and structured publishing mentorship.
Partner value
What partner libraries receive
This page section helps clarify the institutional value proposition in a fully open environment, where exclusivity and gated usage statistics are not the core logic of the model.
A visible public association with support for trusted, diamond open scholarly publishing.
We produce an annual Impact Statement for partners to highlight the value of the contributions made to open publishing.
We offer annual opportunities for partner to contribute to the future strategic direction of OAPA.
Allowing insitutions to identify key areas that they value and bundle together for greater efficiency of scarce resources.
You are helping build and sustain an academic-governed open publishing ecosystem in Australia.
Discounted access, or bundled access, to the OAPA Academy Program for academics and staff in partner institution.
Governance
Governance, transparency and trust
OAPA values transparency, stewardship, and long-term sustainability of open access knowledge.
OAPA as a not-for-profit reinvests all monies into sustaining and expanding its ability to build the national infrastructure to support open knowledge.
OAPA produces an annual statement of impact, and is preparing to seek Australian charitable status with transparent financial reporting.
OAPA aims to become the home of sustainable open access in Australia and New Zealand.
Invitation
An invitation to founding library partners
OAPA invites libraries, institutions and universities to discuss annual partnership participation, multi-year commitments, journal support bundles, and strategic sponsorship opportunities.
Contact
Name
Dr Jo-Anne Kelder
Title
Director of Partnerships and Publishing
Email
partnerships@open-publishing.org
Website
open-publishing.org