As part of the SCOAP3 tendering process conducted by CERN for the benefit of SCOAP3, the agreed-upon Article Processing Charges (APCs) for SCOAP3 participating journals are now publicly available.
Within the SCOAP3 model, these APCs are not paid by authors, but centrally by SCOAP3, from a common fund to which libraries, library consortia, research institutions and funding agencies jointly contribute
Following the effective award of contracts to several journals, and starting January 1st 2014, these journals will publish all SCOAP3 Articles submitted by any author as Open Access in perpetuity under a CC-BY license. Publishers will reduce their subscription fees, where those exist, to account for this conversion of entire journals, or parts thereof, to Open Access. SCOAP3 Articles are defined as either all articles appearing in journals mostly carrying High-Energy Physics content, or articles appearing in “broad band” journals which have been submitted by researchers to arXiv.org under the corresponding categories.
In detail, the maximum yearly payment by SCOAP3 for each journal in 2014 will be based on the individual journal APC and number of SCOAP3 Articles published in 2011 (the latest year for which complete data are available). The APCs themselves and the SCOAP3 budget envelope are fixed for the duration of the three-year contract period (through 2016). In 2015 and 2016, the maximum yearly payments are eligible to grow at a capped rate of between 4% for “large” journals and 25% for “small” journals, to account for potential growth in the number of articles.
The APCs, the reference number of SCOAP3 Articles for 2011 and the corresponding fraction of each journal appear here, in alphabetical order:
| Publisher | Journal | SCOAP3 Articles (In 2011) | SCOAP3 Percentage of journal (In 2011) | Article Processing Charge |
| American Physical Society | Physical Review C | 107 | 9.9% | 1900 USD |
| American Physical Society | Physical Review D | 2989 | 100% | 1900 USD |
| Elsevier | Physics Letters B | 1010 | 100% | 1800 USD |
| Elsevier | Nuclear Physics B | 284 | 100% | 2000 USD |
| Hindawi | Advances in High Energy Physics | 28 | 100% | 1000 USD |
| Institute of Physics Publishing/Chinese Academy of Sciences | Chinese Physics C | 16 | 7.2% | 1000 GBP |
| Institute of Physics Publishing/Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft | New Journal of Physics | 20 | 2.7% | 1200 GBP |
| Institute of Physics Publishing/SISSA | Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics | 138 | 30.9% | 1400 GBP |
| Jagellonian University | Acta Physica Polonica B | 23 | 22.1% | 500 EUR |
| Oxford University Press/Physical Society of Japan | Progress of Theoretical Physics (to become PTEP) | 46 | 36.2% | 1000 GBP |
| Springer/Società Italiana di Fisica | European Physical Journal C | 326 | 100% | 1500 EUR |
| Springer/SISSA | Journal of High Energy Physics | 1652 | 100% | 1200 EUR |
Contracts between publishers and CERN, acting for the benefit of SCOAP3, will be signed after the successful conclusion of three crucial next steps in the SCOAP3 process:
- Reconciliation of subscription fee reductions between publishers and SCOAP3 participating libraries, to take place in the last quarter of 2012 and into the first quarter of 2013;
- Conclusion of a memorandum of understanding between CERN and SCOAP3 partners, which will define a robust governance structure to oversee the operation and future development of SCOAP3;
- Completion of the SCOAP3 budget envelope through re-direction of those subscription funds by existing and prospective SCOAP3 partners.
